Gunboat G4 Timbalero goes top-down in St Barths

If you’ve spent any time online in the last few months, you’ve seen pictures of a cruiser type catamaran hooning around on hydrofoils. The G4 from Gunboat is setting out to re-define the boundaries of a family cruiser/racer, and doing it in spectacular fashion.

But this week, during racing off the ultra-swish island of St Barths, the G4 came unstuck on a downwind leg, capsizing spectacularly and ending up completely upside down. Crew went flying, iPhones were drowned, and we finally got a close look at the J foils that suspend this 2.4 tonne super-cat above the chop. Thankfully, none of the sailors were injured, and not only was there a helicopter in the air filming the whole thing, but a fleet of rescue craft on hand to pick everyone up.

Remarkably, the boat is almost completely undamaged. The rescue crews simply did the usual trick for righting a ‘turtled’ catamaran, by tying a line to one hull, wrapping it around the other and pulling her up. The mast was still there, the sails will be ok after some repairs, and the foils will live to fly another day. All crew were outside during the capsize, luckily, because the G4 has a few queen size beds inside for sleeping. Even the dinner plates and coffee mugs in the galley survived, because remember this thing is designed to cruise! It’s even got a kitchen sink.

Check out the spectacular capsize of the Gunboat G4 – Timbalero III this week while racing in the Les Voiles de St. Barth 2015.