Oops! Accomplished Sailor Goes Overboard on Bathroom Break

Thank goodness for watertight cell phones! Luckily, this definitely won’t be what she’s most remembered for in her career.

Florence Arthaud’s career almost ended in a tragically ignominious manner after she fell into the sea  Saturday night while answering a pressing call of nature without taking basic precautions. Ms. Arthaud, 54, emerged with a new nickname — the “Mediterranean Miracle” — after rescuers found her thanks to her cell phone and head torch.

“I stupidly fell into the water going to have a tinkle over the rail without attaching myself as usual,” she told French television. “A small wave came and destabilized the boat. It’s never happened to me before. “The water wasn’t too cold, but it wasn’t too hot either and I wasn’t at all equipped for that — I had practically nothing in the way of gear on me.”

She was sailing for her own pleasure off Corsica when the accident occurred, The London Times reported. Ms. Arthaud may have forgotten to tie herself on to The Argade II, her 32 ft. yacht, but she had at least taken care to buy a watertight cell phone.

“I bought it just before I set off,” she said.

The sailor called her mother and brother in Paris, who contacted the French Mediterranean sea rescue center. Rescuers were able to locate the area in which she had fallen through her cell phone GPS coordinates. They then pinpointed her by spotting the light from her head torch. Ms. Arthaud was in the water at a temperature of 64F for an hour and a half and was suffering from hypothermia when she was found.

“When you think you’re going to drown, it’s a little bit frightening — very frightening in fact. You think of all your friends who have disappeared in similar conditions,” she said.

She was taken to the hospital in Bastia, Corsica, but was released after doctors gave her a clean bill of health.

Courtesy of www.telegraph.com/au.