In the engine room the propellershaft was mowing freely,jackshaft inspected normal,and oil level in transmission completely normal without any discolouration of the transmission oil. I could even see the gears in the transmission moving normal with the movement from the propeller shaft in the waves. Our hope now was something in the propeller explaining why we couldn´t engage any gear allthough several attempts during the night. Heaving to on a parachute anchor means you are swinging in headseas which means quite comfortable circumstances onboard,but the bath platform in the stern is mowing heavily. With a wetsuit,snorkelgear,and a rope around my waist I managed to dive down to the propeller as well as move the shaft and to my disappointment it was all normal. That meant we still had no explanation to our "frozen" gears and subsequently no way to rectify our problem.

We were now both starting to focus on sailing which meant we would never be able to retreive the parachute anchor but would have to cut the rope. It meant heading for closest land which would be Brasil (around 1.000Nm),and it would probably mean a lot of handsteering. Food,water and battery power would be no problem as long as the generator and watermaker was working. We then went to start the engine and to our great joy and surprise it was now all working normal !?!

Heading for the pennant line we could retrieve the parachute anchor up on deck,go up to marching speed on 1500rpm with course wsw,set a bottomreefed mainsail and furl out parts of the genoa. After an hour we were back on track and allthough still 24-28kts of wind with 3m seas all was back to normal again.

What happened that night is,and will remain, a mystery. Something must have hit and trapped the propeller but ultimately lost grip and disappeared.

One old Canadian sailing friend of Mercedes who heard the story (FB of course) told us he had experienced something similar once sailing in Bahamas. They suddenly had a strong mechanical sound on the boat with immidiate engine shutdown. Not being able to engage any gear they sailed to port. The only odd observation they did was a tiger shark constantly following their boat all way to the anchorage. Once the shark was gone they dove on the propeller and found the head of a bullshark cut and trapped in the propeller !?

Allthough this is not a likely scenarion for Dora Mac´s problem it is a well known fact that sharks have an organ in the nose (The ampulls of Lorencine) for detecting the electrical charge of blood proteins. Sharks are also known for biting propellers of outboards which generate small electrical fields.

Allthough a spectacular explanation,there were no signs of bites or injuries to the propeller. The rest is up to fantasy and imagination