Video: Whale Nearly Capsizes Boat
During the seventh leg of the 2011/2012 Volvo Ocean Race (a high-speed yacht race that, thanks to a treacherous 39,000 nautical miles and nine months at sea, describes itself as the "Everest of Sailing,") one team almost ran—literally—into a whale of a problem.
The CAMPER was traveling at more than 20 knots (which equates to just under 25 mph, for you landlubbers) when, just ahead, an enormous whale surfaced. Thanks to some quick maneuvering by Roberto "Chuny" Bermudez, who was at the helm at the time, both boat and crew were able to just barely avoid a seafaring traffic accident: "We narrowly missed what could have been the equivalent of a runaway freight train colliding with a truck," crew member Hamish Hooper said.
Check out the footage below. The whale surfaces eight seconds in (and your blood pressure gets jacked up around nine seconds).