On Thursday afternoon 3rd April at approximately 1700 local time the Amelia A3 approximately 150 foot steel ferry was returning to her normal berth in Tyrrel Bay, Carriacou, Grenada, from which it had departed about an hour previously. The ferry, a former Norwegian fjord ferry now registered in Kingstown, St Vincent.   Oriole was anchored towards the north side of the yacht mooring and anchorage area and from the cockpit we observed Amelia A3 turning to go astern towards the ro-ro dock about 150 yards away.  However she did not complete the turn and continued astern towards Oriole.  We watched as the ferry came back towards Oriole and could see there was no one on the stern of the vessel to observe where she was going.  We were looking to see the moment she started to go forwards to continue the turn, but she kept coming astern.  It became painfully apparent that she was going to continue towards us. Eventually a horror struck face appeared at the top of the ramp which was partially lowered.  At this stage we had our engine going and were attempting to motor forward to avoid or minimise the now inevitable collision.   However we were too late and the ferry hit the port side of Oriole amidships where the toe rail was splintered and the stanchions bent inwards and simultaneously the ramp caught the backstay and ripped the forestay out of the stem head fitting and the top 10 foot section of the mast fell down.  The yacht heeled to around 45 degrees and the skipper and mate abandoned ship into the dinghy as they feared the yacht might be pulled right over.  We observed the mayhem for a few minutes and then returned on board Oriole to assist the  crew of the ferry to disentangle Oriole's backstay from the ferry's ramp.  Once freed from the anchored yacht, the anchor of which appeared to have held,  the ferry with its engine stopped continued to drift amongst the anchored and moored yachts until it managed to lower its own anchor.  Other yacht crews having seen what was happening to Oriole moved yachts out of the way of the ferry leaving a large area which was previously filled with anchored boats. Oriole then moved to the dock with a view to lifting the damaged mast with the crane, and to allow the ferry space to be towed and warped back to the ferry dock.  We were told that the engines of the ferry had jammed in astern gear and that they had needed to stop the engine itself after the impact. In the event the crane was not available.

Oriole's severed section of mast was being prevented from descending to the deck by its internal halyards and wiring and the foil of the jib furler, which was holding it away from the remaining, still standing lower section of the mast, but was swinging dangerously. The skipper climbed the mast and with hydraulic bolt cutters, cut the top of the forestay and it was then possible to lash the former top end of the mast to the remainder to stabilise it. The detached foil was lashed to lifelines along the starboard side of the yacht.   It was well after dark around 1900 that Oriole was re-anchored for the night.

On Friday morning three fellow yachtsmen helped the skipper and mate to lower the severed section of mast and clear away the tangled rigging and make the rig secure, an operation which took most of the day.  It became quite clear that this would have been extremely difficult impossible to achieve without the use of Oriole's hydraulic wire/bolt cutters which enabled the skipper to cut the 9 mm rigging while aloft. Long lever type cutters would have been impracticable.

An assessment of the damage while Oriole was alongside the dock revealed that the hull appeared sound and not making water into the bilge.  All the deck gear at the stern was mangled - stern pulpit severely bent, wind generator pole bent with GPS antenna and wind generator torn off it,  satellite communication antenna torn off and it's mounting pole bent, backstay tensioner bent, Hydravane wind steering system bent, outboard motor storage bracket badly cracked, gas BBQ mounted on the stern rail partially torn from its mounting, life belt and mounting bracket torn and bent, danbuoy severely bent, backstay chain plate bent and the teak toe rail splintered, ensign staff broken in two. On the port side three stanchions were severely bent and the teak toe rail which must have absorbed a lot of the impact was splintered from amidships towards the aft end.  The foil of the jib furler was bent.  As the furler fell it broke the outboard motor tiller mounting, and starboard side boarding ladder.  At this stage it appears that the hull is sound and that the massively strong hull to deck bond has not been disturbed. The skipper and mate were severely shocked but physically unhurt.  They think that if the only partially successful avoiding action had not been taken that the ferry would have hit the entire port side of the yacht which would have been trapped under the ferry ramp, and possibly completely rolled over and sunk.  As it was the impact was at the aft half of the yacht.  At no stage was there any warning given from the ferry that it was out of control, either vocally from its stern or via VHF radio.  There was no lookout on the stern until moments before the impact.  It is now apparent that the brief voyage from Tyrrel Bay was to test the engine.

A diver later retrieved the Oriole's masthead burgee and mounting stick which had been torn off together with other damaged parts of the masthead gear.  The wind generator was also sighted but not recovered.  There was no sign of the  mate's missing teacup!