Charlie Smith
A DARING adventurer has set sail from Spain in a barrel in a bid to float across the Atlantic Ocean using only sea currents.
Jean-Jacques Savin, 71, aims to reach the Caribbean in three months after beginning his bizarre voyage in El Hierro, the Canary Islands.
At just 3m by 2.10m, the bright orange barrel, complete with a kitchen and bed, cost €60,000 and features a porthole in the floor for watching fish.
“The weather is great. I’ve got a swell of one metre and I’m moving at 2-3km/h… I’ve got favourable winds forecast until Sunday,” said Savin.
The Frenchman departed with a bottle of white wine to see in the new year, a bottle of red for his birthday on January 14 and even a block of foie gras pate.
The former military paratrooper aims to reach Barbados, but joked that he would ‘like it to be a French island’ as it would ‘be easier for the paperwork and for bringing the barrel back’.
The resin-coated reinforced plywood capsule is built to be wave-resistant and is strong enough to resist killer whale attacks.
Although the French veteran’s excursion is reminiscent of an old storybook, the trip will help oceanographers from JCOMMOPS study sea currents.
Those interested in the mammoth journey can keep updated through the ‘TESA : Traversée de l’Atlantique en Tonneau’ Facebook page.
