Peter Sissons interviewed Jonathan Gornall

On Sunday, 15 August 2004, Peter Sissons interviewed Jonathan Gornall, Journalist and Pink Lady crew member.

Please note "BBC Breakfast with Frost" must be credited if any part of this transcript is used.

Jonathan Gornall, Journalist and Pink Lady crew member

PETER SISSONS: During the programme last week we reported that the four British oarsmen who were attempting to set a new record for rowing across the Atlantic had been rescued, after their boat was destroyed by a freak wave.

They spent several hours in terrifying conditions 300 miles off the Scilly Isles clinging to a life raft while they waited to be picked up.

An RAF aircraft was scrambled but they eventually got safely aboard a passing ship. Well one of the rowers, the Times journalist Jonathan Gornall, is with me now. Jonathan, I'm glad to see you've dried out.

JONATHAN GORNALL: Yes, it's nice to be here.

PETER SISSONS: It was the second time you'd attempted to row across the Atlantic - three years ago you gave up a solo attempt.

JONATHAN GORNALL: It didn't begin as a solo attempt, I had a partner who lost interest after about a week and I ploughed on for 45 days and suddenly realised my own company wasn't quite as exciting as I thought it was and I gave up that attempt. This was my, my chance to sort of set the record straight for myself.

PETER SISSONS: But you vowed after that that you'd never do it again.

JONATHAN GORNALL: Yes.

PETER SISSONS: But you did.

JONATHAN GORNALL: I did.

PETER SISSONS: What's the position now?

JONATHAN GORNALL: I'm vowing again that I'll, I'll not go back - but I think I mean it this time because last time I failed, this time we were failed by the weather, which was earlier than usual and we had the tail end of Alex, the first of the hurricanes this year, we're seeing it's brother - sister rather - this weekend.

We couldn't have done any better, we couldn't have worked harder and we were going to get the record, we were very, very close, so it is disappointing.

PETER SISSONS: But your fellow rowers are already talking about doing it again.

JONATHAN GORNALL: When we were clinging to the life raft - huddling in the life raft to be more precise - we all talked about this, as you might imagine, and there wasn't a single person on that life raft who was going to do it again.

PETER SISSONS: How - you had warning of this storm, didn't you?

JONATHAN GORNALL: Yes, ... three or four

PETER SISSONS: So you were really waiting for it, knowing, not knowing when it would hit or how it would hit.

JONATHAN GORNALL: Unlike a yacht, we don't have the speed to get out of the way of these things, so three or four days before, our weather router in the USA first mentioned the H word. And at first it was nothing to do with us but it began to track across the Atlantic as it had us in its sights.

PETER SISSONS: And there's a bit of kit you've got next to you, which probably saved your life, as much as anything -

JONATHAN GORNALL: Well it saved my life but I, I don't know if you can see this but this is a survival suit and it has a very large zip across the front. In the cabin, where I was awaiting the arrival of the worst of the storm, it became so hot that I very foolishly unzipped my survival suit and the next thing I knew I was under water.

I fought to get out of the wreckage, which at one point I thought I wasn't going to do, and having escaped from it I then realised I was sinking and it was because my survival suit was filled with water.

PETER SISSONS: And nearly became a non-survival suit.

JONATHAN GORNALL: Exactly, yes, yes.

PETER SISSONS: But how close - I mean seriously - how close to death did you come?

JONATHAN GORNALL: I thought I was drowning. I was in, in the cabin, a tremendous weight of water plunges you immediately underwater, there is no air, there is no light.

I was holding my breath - some sort of instinctive reaction - and I was calmly thinking "I need air within the next sort of 30 seconds or so or I'm going to drown.

" And my chest was hurting and I could find no way out of the wreckage. It was scary, not at the time, later, looking back, now thinking about it I realise how close I came - that's really why I'm thinking "let's not go there again."

PETER SISSONS: But you wrote, in The Times, "rowing the ocean highlighted for me how wonderful ordinary life is."

JONATHAN GORNALL: Absolutely.

PETER SISSONS: A lot of people row the ocean and think how wonderful nature is -

JONATHAN GORNALL: Yes.

PETER SISSONS: - with all the whales and sea life and birds they see - but for you, it made you want to stay at home.

JONATHAN GORNALL: It made me glad that I was going home. The best part of travelling for me is always coming home and I was never so grateful when I saw the Nimrod flying over the waves, it seemed to symbolise all that's wonderful about England and our society - a society which is there for you even in extreme circumstances.

There's been a bit of criticism, as you would imagine, "why turn out to rescue these fools who do these things?" Well, all I would say to that is that the four fools on that boat, two of them served their country in the forces, I've sent my own son off to war, there was a fireman on the ship - if you can cut slack for anybody, I think, in those circumstances, it was us four taxpayers.

And to cap the whole story off, we've been invited up to Lossiemouth to meet the crew of the Nimrod who were as thrilled to be involved as we were thrilled that they were involved. We're very happy about that because we want to shake their hands.

---

NB: this transcript was typed from a recording and not copied from an original script.

Because of the possibility of mis-hearing and the difficulty, in some cases, of identifying individual speakers, the BBC cannot vouch for its accuracy.

---