The 40-foot waves documented in multiple accounts of the Hazana’s situation on October 12 are not the gentle swells of a tranquil Pacific morning. A 40-foot wave is a structure approximately the height of a four-story building. When it breaks — and in storm conditions, waves break frequently — it releases a volume of water moving at the wave’s celerity. A single breaking wave of this size can sweep a vessel’s deck of everything not bolted down and exert a lateral force on the hull sufficient to capsize or structurally damage most yachts.
The Hazana was pitchpoled: lifted by one of these waves and flipped end over end. The word conveys the mechanics but not the experience. In a pitchpoling event, the entire vessel — 44 feet of fiberglass, with its masts, sails, rigging, engine, fuel, water, and all aboard — is rotated through 360 degrees around the athwartships (side-to-side) axis. The bow goes under; the stern comes over; everything that is not secured internally is thrown to the opposite end of the vessel.
Oldham was thrown against the cabin wall. The wall was no longer the wall; it was, for the duration of the rotation, the floor. She hit it with the force of a person falling from a height, in a moving vessel, with no warning. The resulting head injury — the gash, the 27 hours of unconsciousness — was the consequence of that impact.
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## Why She Couldn’t Use the EPIRB
The Emergency Position-Indicating Radio Beacon, or EPIRB, is one of the most important pieces of safety equipment carried on offshore vessels. Its purpose is straightforward: in the event of a sinking or other emergency, the EPIRB transmits a distress signal on a monitored frequency that allows search and rescue authorities to locate the vessel’s position.