Pasties lost as boat sinks off Devon

But people are safe!

A sailor from Wales who makes regular trips across the Bristol Channel to buy pasties in Ilfracombe is lamenting the loss of his boat - and nine pasties that ended up in Davy Jones' locker.

The two-man crew of the Gazelle have thanked RNLI for rescuing them from their sinking boat.

RNLI Ilfracombe launched both lifeboats to go to the aid of a 32ft cruiser which was reported as taking in water near Baggy Point near Crowed.

Paul Hadfield, owner of the Gazelle has had a 50+ year career on boats and regularly heads to Ilfracombe from his home in South Wales. “It’s the pasties,” that bring him here, he explains. “You can’t get anything like them in Swansea. We’d been in Ilfracombe for the day and I’d got nine pasties for colleagues back home”.

He told the RNLI: “It was a bit snotty as it is around Baggy but we weren’t horsing it, just easing round to the quieter waters. Then a wave hit us and there was pretty sick swell so I think that is what did it – the wave popped out the saloon window and rushed in and the volume of water already on the foredeck from the swell also swamped us and suddenly we had water up to our knees in the saloon”.

They set the bilge pumps going to get rid of the water and tried to ease the boat very slowly south-west to get away from Baggy and back towards Ilfracombe but they were taking on far more water then than they could pump out. “I could see those nine pasties were already floating”, he remembers. “And we knew that trying anything more was just going to cause personal risk to ourselves. It wasn’t worth trying anything more. I knew this wasn't going to end well like it does in the movies.”

The RNLI crews quickly found the Gazelle after being called by the coastguard, and took the two friends off the boat and began towing the boat back to Ilfracombe Harbour.

Sadly, after a short time, the boat began to sink. Paul, sitting inside the lifeboat at the time, remembers “I heard the engines of the lifeboat ease back and I thought ‘that’s it, she’s on her way’”.

Since the sinking, the Gazelle has been breaking up with various pieces of debris having already been retrieved by the lifeboat including the Gazelle’s wheelhouse roof.

Ilfracombe's all-weather lifeboat returns to harbour with the Gazelle crew (image courtesy: Ilfracombe RNLI)

Stuart Carpenter, coxswain on the all-weather lifeboat that day, said "The two men were absolutely right to call for help: they were in an extremely precarious situation with the boat taking on so much water so quickly. Our first priority is always to rescue people before vessels and we are very pleased we were able to do that on this occasion. As we found out, the Gazelle had only minutes before sinking - if her crew had not been so cautious and called the Coastguard when they did, they could have been in the water with their boat."

The Gazelle was a former race cruiser built more than 50 years ago in 1972. Paul and his family feel the loss of her greatly. “She’d had a complete refurb just before Covid,” he says “and so she had another 50 years in her I’m sure.”

Paul described the sinking as 'a day I will never forget'. All is not lost, however, he already has plans to visit Ilfracombe again to buy some more pasties.