It is still a closed box, rectangular, with rounded edges, weighing 31 kilos. ISO 9650-2 is written on the lid. The International Organisation for Standardisation means: approved for coastal waters, designed for maritime emergencies lasting up to 24 hours.
The box lies ready on the stern of the yacht, like a suitcase about to embark on a strange journey. The white container exudes a certain aura. I see high waves in my mind's eye, foaming waves, flying spray. Nothing you really want. Especially not when you're forced to switch from boat to raft, to mutate from sailor to islander.
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If this happens, every trip ends. The yacht burns, sinks or has already run aground. What comes next is a mere fight for survival. In the life raft, the occupants become the plaything of the sea. No longer sailors, just a kind of will-less cork.
Many yachts have such a raft on board. It is usually lashed to the deck like an unopened omen. Most have never seen it in action, never tested it, never dealt with the technology and equipment. Even the maintenance intervals are often generously ignored. The motto: It will work!
In a rubber room on drift
It is a strange, almost absurd ignorance. Because the life raft is the last alternative to drifting in the sea. To sinking. Every skipper should know exactly how the thing works. It would be damn advantageous to know: How easy is it to get in? How do you close the roof? How much water does a life raft like this take on when two, three or four soaking wet sailors with oilskins, boots and waistcoats heave themselves inside? How does it feel to go drifting in such a rubber cell?
Most people don't realise it. Hardly anyone voluntarily releases their raft to simply test it in good conditions. This is because putting it back into operation is many hundreds of euros expensive - if it can be done at all. Some manufacturers refuse to carry out any maintenance after use in salt water. And there are probably not very many skippers who have completed specific safety training, including evacuating the yacht and retreating to the life raft in an organised manner.
484 days at sea: Probably the longest shipwreck drift lasted more than a year and a half. The Japanese merchant captain Oguri Jukichi had to endure the Pacific from October 1813 to March 1815. However, he was not adrift on a life raft, but on his cargo ship, whose masts he had had cut in the storm. From then on, the crew subsisted on the cargo: soya beans. Of the 13 crew members, only one survived apart from Oguri.
Obtaining the life raft
On a Monday at the beginning of September, an exceptional exercise takes place on the Baltic Sea for precisely this reason, which is intended to make it possible to relive the sea emergency at least to some extent: Heave the container overboard, release it - and drift for a night in the sea-going cocoon. What exactly happens then? How does it feel to be exposed? How cosy or uncomfortable will it be on
0.4 square metres of rubber raft per person?
North-westerly wind, 3 to 4 Beaufort, hardly any waves. The sun sinks towards the horizon as our yacht sails south of Fehmarn towards Großenbrode. The water is still quite warm at 16 to 17 degrees. The Plastimo raft, model Coastal 6, slaps into the water and lurches astern. A tug on the line - nothing. Another jerk, more energetic this time - again nothing. Only the line gets longer. Only when it snaps for the third time is there a dull bang, followed by a loud hiss.
Then the lid flips open and black rubber unfolds, inflates, becomes thick and round, tips briefly onto its side and promptly straightens up again. Less than ten seconds later, our life raft for the night is afloat. A square of two bulging rubber beads - and the first thing we realise in amazement: "It doesn't even have a roof! The raft is completely open!"
One by one we climb over, a simple exercise in these conditions. The island wobbles and wobbles a little, but every jump is successful. We sink to the thin floor and lean against the round ridges. The CO2 cartridge hanging outboard is still hissing. Or is there perhaps a leak?
133 days at sea: The Chinese Poon Lim survived alone on a wooden life raft in the South Atlantic for more than four months after his cargo ship was sunk by a German submarine on 23 November 1942. He made himself a knife from a biscuit tin and fishing hooks from a nail and torch wire.
Pretty tight
We listen, feel for it, feel along the ridges. I start to feel uneasy. But Michael brings me back down to earth: "It's the overpressurisation, the chambers are too full." He looks for one of the valves and lets some air out. The hissing finally stops. "Quite normal," says Michael. In an emergency, the experience would have been bitter, the loss of confidence in the raft immeasurable. When you already fear for your life, the worry of sitting on a possibly defective island seems completely unbearable.
But we - actually - have it pretty good. There are only three of us: Rike, Michael and me. The life raft is authorised for six passengers. So it should be a pretty comfortable night, we think in our naivety.
But the hours will quickly teach us what space, time and cold mean if you challenge fate just once. When you leave the comfort zone of the yacht - and enter the emergency shelter at sea.
Seven o'clock in the evening, the sun hangs at an angle over the grey-blue Baltic Sea. We release the connecting line to the yacht and soon float slowly away to the east. We want to hold out for twelve hours until the sun rises in the east in the morning.
We've all never been on an island like this for any length of time. "Sailing," corrects Rike, an inland sailor from the Alster with her first trips on yachts. She frowns and looks around. Then the words are uttered for the first time: "It's pretty cramped in here." Michael, who has sailing and technical experience, thinks: "It'll be fine." He doesn't convince me: "The Russian cosmonauts have more space in their Soyuz capsules. There's room for six people in here? You're crazy!"
Self-test under laboratory conditions
We lie, crouch and kneel in the tiny space like squashed jelly babies. But first we have to set up the tent - because we still don't have a roof over our heads. We hold up the cloth and consider whether a paddle could support the tent. Only then do we have the idea of checking the equipment provided for something more useful. There are poles stowed there - like those of a geodesic tent.
117 days at sea: Marilyn and Maurice Bailey survived for almost four months in a life raft in 1973 after their yacht ran aground in the Galapagos. They fed on raw fish, turtles and seabirds, survived storms and shark attacks. Their moving book "117 Days Adrift" is only available in antiquarian bookshops.
What follows is a hilarious procedure in a very confined space. Holding on to the cloth, fumbling with the Velcro, putting the poles together, looking for eyelets, feeling for any lugs, finding the wrong eyelets, putting them in, slipping, trying again. It takes fifteen minutes for the dome to arch over our heads. "Do that in a storm, maybe with four or five metre waves," I say. "Then everything here will fly around your ears." Rike says: "And then do it when there are six of you in here, you'll impale each other." Michael says: "It's not meant to be a bathing platform."
There we sit. Like in a tiny spaceship with a diffuse, orange-coloured Martian light shining through its walls. Exposed, cut off, crammed in. Outside, the Baltic Sea laps softly. It's eight o'clock in the evening and the sky is getting darker. For the first time, some peace returns. Our legs lie on top of each other, next to each other. Mine over Michael's, Rike's under mine. The bag with the emergency rations is in the centre.
At least we have nothing to fear. There's a handheld radio on the island, the yacht is nearby and the sea rescuers know about it. Basically a presumption in the face of any real emergency. We only simulate when the weather is calm. It's unimaginable what people go through in a miniature like this, rolling across the ocean in storms, cold and metre-high waves. At the risk of their lives. With no certainty that they will be rescued.
Scary moment in the life raft
By nine, all the sun has disappeared. We have a gap in the tent open and look out. A good two hours have passed. I look at my watch for the first time and count the remaining time. An orange-coloured ball with a white ribbon dangles in front of my nose. It's an opening to the outside: if you unroll the cloth, you can stick your head out of the island. A kind of tunnel for the neck to keep an eye out, to collect rainwater. Or, again, to defecate outboard. That's one of the purposes of the lock. After all, it's unlikely to be much fun if someone sends the last meal inside the capsule while the boat is rocking - and everyone is stuck in porridge from then on. Not good for the mood at all!
I feel the equipment behind me. The yellow straps, the paddle and the valve are already getting on my nerves. The valve is pressing directly on the back of my neck, but there's hardly any room to turn away. We are still happy and joking. But my back, which is resting as if on a waterbed, is slowly getting cold. There is moisture on the uneven floor.
And then suddenly there's a bang!
Behind us, one of the thick zip fasteners that protectively secures the black nylon fabric around the floats has burst. It sounds like a gunshot. A bulging rubber arm spurts out from inside the chamber. Another enervating shock. More tinkering. We let air out of the chamber, push the bead in and close the zip with difficulty. You don't want to experience this when it's raging outside.
Actual maritime emergencies
There are bad stories that take place in life rafts. In the 1970s, three Germans drifted in their rubber raft on the high seas in the southern Pacific for almost a month. A Canadian survived in the Pacific for almost three months. It took almost four months before a British couple whose yacht had sunk after colliding with a whale was rescued. His odyssey is about every imaginable purgatory that the sea can devise: Thirst, hunger, heat, cold, illness, storms, capsizing.
In the end, it wasn't luck that helped, but the sheer will to survive - and the fact that they had taken their inflatable dinghy with them. In many cases, it is the dinghies that contribute significantly to survival. They are better for fishing and more effective for collecting rain. Damage to the life raft is also easier to repair from the outside. Every mill of extra space is then worth its weight in gold.
Nevertheless, being exposed to the ocean for weeks or even months must be an indescribable ordeal. The American Louis Zamperini went through such an ordeal. During the Second World War, his bomber crashed over the Pacific, leaving him and two other crew members adrift at sea in two rubber boats for 47 days. Zamperini - 1.80 metres tall and previously weighing 72 kilos - had lost a good 35 kilos afterwards. He suffered inflammation and chemical burns from the salt water and resembled a skeleton covered in rotting skin. He described himself as follows: "All that's left of me is a breathing corpse." You can't even imagine it.
Nature is calling - what now?
I peer outside through a gap in the island's roof. The moon is now bright and shining over the Baltic Sea. The sea is flat, we are almost floating in oil. It looks beautiful. But I imagine what the worst-case scenario could be like: North Sea, force ten winds, seas seven metres high. The tent above our heads would flap like crazy, fountains of salt water would shoot through every slit. We would freeze and shiver, scoop and bail like madmen. We would be scared to death - by far the worst ingredient in such a situation. Then a wave would break, grab us and throw us through. The paddles would fly around, the emergency bellows would whizz through the area. Up would be down, down would be up. Enveloped by the ice-cold sea, a life like in a washing machine.
It's long past midnight. We have to pee. We'd have to peel out of our clothes, into the sea or into our trousers, possibly in the middle of the life raft, in front of the others. We chicken out. We briefly board the yacht that accompanies us to safety. We do it there, feel the warmth, the peace, the solid ground. We would prefer to stay, but immediately get back into the damp island, we bathtub sailors.
The time drags on like chewing gum. Six more full hours. Lying down hurts by now. I'm cold as arse. I'm wet and stiff and dog-tired. "Why don't you get into the body bag," Rike teases. I grab one of the yellow plastic covers that you can crawl into. The thermal covers are part of the emergency kit we took with us. I have to bend terribly to get in, I stick my sea boots right in Michael's face during the manoeuvre. But once inside the plastic bag, it at least warms me up a bit. I notice this: Everything here is made of plastic - the raft, the tent, the emergency containers, the first aid kit, the life jackets, the packaging for the shrink-wrapped emergency rations.
"Keep calm and keep a sense of humour"
We have long since rummaged through the supplements packed by the manufacturer in the life raft. A red waterproof bag contains all sorts of practical items: torch, spare batteries, glow sticks, signal rockets, repair kit, sponges, signal mirrors, 36 seasickness tablets and - if they don't help - six vomit bags. An additional Seasafe bag is not part of the raft, Michael has brought it with him. In it: six units of drinking water, two packets of "Transocean Emergency Ration" - small high-calorie briquettes made from roasted wheat, fat, sugar, protein and vitamins. It even tastes okay: dry, crumbly, sweet.
I try to sleep and doze off for a good hour. Rike tells me to move my left leg, she can't lie like this any more. But she's not lying down at all; she's stuffed herself sideways into an alcove, resting in a crouched position. In the middle of the night, Michael takes a book out of his bag and reads a short story by Siegfried Lenz. Killing time, even now, after eight miserable hours.
We can guess: Boredom can become a horror on an island like this. Dragging days in confinement - only sea, only swaying, only sky. When does the first person lose their composure? When does the mood change? And, quite trivially - what if you have to? Really, really big. In front of everyone else!
We think for a moment and quickly agree: this is probably the least of your problems when you're slithering through doom in a rubber case. There are far greater demons waiting.
What could be coming? We leaf through the five-language survival notes that come with the island. In German it reads: "Überlenchilfe", with a "c" instead of an "s", and we can only hope that the manufacturer has put more effort into vulcanising the air chambers than into translating them. Rule number one, in bold print: "Keep calm and your sense of humour, a good constitution is of the utmost importance."
Do everything you can to make sure you never need this thing
Humour! Tell that to someone who is currently riding the hurricane. Other tips include: Cast out drift anchors, spread the load, dress as much as possible in cold weather, keep the floor dry. Secure all material in the island. Never drink seawater or urine.
It's still night outside, really cold and wet now. After ten hours, we literally feel cornered. Rike draws parallels with being trapped in a mine tunnel. My bum has fallen asleep in the meantime. When I turn round, I'm lying on the signal rockets. The lack of space is actually the worst thing. Everyone who has experienced it reports it. So always have a larger island on board? A six for four, at least. Blue water sailors advise it.
My cigarettes have slipped away, can't find them again in the chaos. I can't even reach under my back with my arm, I can barely turn round, straighten up and roll away. "Why don't you stop smoking," says Rike. "Our life raft night is a good occasion." I give her a dirty look. Michael sees it differently: "Nah, not a good idea. In a situation like this, everyone should take what they want. Cigarettes, rum, games, books. It'll be the last little luxury until the rescue, important for nerves and morale."
Finally, the sky is reddening in the east, the sun is making an appearance and we really only want one thing: to get out of here! But we have still managed to avoid what is usually unavoidable: getting out of the water! That's what most people have to do when they have to enter the island - hardly anyone manages to do it dry-shod. The ripcord is eight to ten metres long, in wind and waves the island is displaced in no time at all, and then you have to climb or jump from a damaged yacht right into a sardine can. The hit rate in rough seas is like the HSV team's chances of winning the championship.
Michael, unabashed hero of the night, then dares to finish. He slides into the water and tries to get back in. It works. But it's damn hard. In full gear, his arms fumble for support, for the handholds, for the holding straps on the inside, for the rudimentary auxiliary ladder on the outside. He has to pull and heave hard, half the island bends - only then does he land on his stomach, like a dripping wet sack, with us inside. Loads of salt water pour onto the floor, and after three attempts we are all lying in a pool. It sloshes through the island, an ice-cold bathtub. The water soaks into our boots, runs up our arms and crawls down our legs.
The cold wetness at the end of the test night is like an urgent warning. And so the next time I see the white container on the deck of my yacht, I will take rule number one to heart even more than before: always do everything, everything, but really everything, so that you never need this thing!
Expertise for emergencies at sea
Equipment for emergencies
The company Sostechnic offers special emergency equipment, internationally known as "grab bags", which can be taken along at any time. The watertight bag contains water, food, medication and signalling equipment, among other things. We had an ISO 9650-compliant test specimen on board during the sea trial, designed for coastal areas where rescue is likely within 24 hours. The complete set for four people can be individually expanded, for example to include special medication for chronically ill crew members. Extended packages are also available for use on the high seas. More information: www.sostechnic.de
Preparation is everything
In an emergency at sea, sailors are quickly overwhelmed despite being fully equipped because everything is new, from dealing with the deployed lifejacket to the question of what to take with them and how to handle the life raft. However, it is possible to practise for emergencies under the guidance of experts - for example during safety training for sailors at the Wesermarsch Maritime Training Centre in Elsfleth. Various weather scenarios can be simulated and rescue equipment practised in the centre's own wave pool.
In an emergency
Before boarding the life raft, remember the most important things: take an emergency pack, a head torch, lifejacket and communication equipment. If there is still time, put on plenty of warm clothing under your oilskins. If possible, climb over dry. Do not deploy life jackets without need, they take up a lot of space.
Look out, call for help
If the yacht is lost and all crew members are in the life raft, you need to get help as quickly as possible. Ideally, an emergency call should be made before the transfer. If this is no longer possible, it is then a top priority. A waterproof mobile phone can help, as can a handheld radio, an Epirb or a satellite mobile phone, which should be part of the emergency equipment. If you have no phone reception, your smartphone is not automatically worthless. You can at least find your way with a sat nav app. The few signalling devices should not be used at random, but only when land or shipping is nearby. On the one hand, this requires a lookout, otherwise you will quickly lose your bearings with the roof closed. On the other hand, knowing your own position and the drift helps you to estimate when rescue is most likely.
How big is big enough?
The ISO 9650 standard for life rafts stipulates a minimum surface area of 1.488 square metres for four people. That's only 0.37 square metres per person - just 60 by 60 centimetres! Before buying, you should therefore consider how many sailors are usually on board and then choose an island for twice as many people. The next question is the right place. If the island is sheltered, a bag will suffice. However, if it is lashed to the deck, it must be a model in a container. Then take a close look at what equipment is included so that the emergency pack can be customised accordingly. Manufacturers usually recommend maintenance every three years, even if this is not mandatory on private yachts. The minimum service life of the islands is usually specified as 12 to 15 years.
