TO ADD TO WHAT NEAL HAS SAID ABOUT MASTS.

Neal Gates told part of the story and correctly. I hope it really is Neal posting and not someone winding me up.
The big tower came down, Ronan raged at the crew for incompetence and negligence. Then he considered what to do. I was walking through London with him and found him staring at a huge tower crane. ' Look' he said' we could get one of those without the crane and it has a hoist inside. If the mast needed attention we could send Chicago up in the hoist to make repairs'. He checked the cost and never mentioned this again.
Then he considered seeking two tall trees thinking that there must be hundreds brought down by the hurricane.
In the meantime Chicago and Ernie were making ' something' that might send a weak signal even a token one. We needed something at the stern. Ronan found a ' Versatower ' that could be cranked up to 80ft with a hand winch. But he wanted to get it without paying and drew me in to a ploy that would be legally described as 'obtaining goods by deception '. But the seller was too smart and Ronan had to pay. He was incandescent with fury. Even this mast was only a stop gap.
Mike Watts told Mick Dundee and I about a mast supplier. We went to his yard and poked about and just about to give up, Dundee saw some 20ft mast sections. The seller said that at £250 each, we could have as many as we liked. I think we first bought two but the Dutch sort of kidnapped them in a money dispute. We had to buy more. We planned 8 sections to make a 160ft mast. Chicago then said that he wanted two masts bow and stern. Ronan had told him some nonsense that the original 300ft mast would be copied in Spain and flown out to the Ross under a helicopter so the middle of the ship needed to be kept clear.
Then it was suggested that our masts were not strong enough so had to be built side by side up to the 40ft level. All the tme we needed more sections which were transported in different ways. We modified a trailer from the Zodiac rubber boat towed behind an old Volvo and collected two, sometimes three, at a time taken to Herne Bay via Highgate. Mike Plumley hired a flat bed lorry and brought some to us. John as stated borrowed an open top bus and ruined it by delivering two sections to Hoo in Kent and we took them the rest of the way where Dave Turner took them two at a time to Revenge.
They were built but never finished since as the work was near completion the ship was raided. Neal has also stated that a ship cannot lose its registration until entering port. He may well be correct.But the fees were not up to date as Ronan had not paid. The French were complaining about the SW being on 6215 which was a distress frequency. So with hese factors Panama said they did not object to a raid and Marten Roumen duly organised it.

So much wasted effort,

PM.