Skip NovakSkip Novak, born in 1952 is an American based in Europe. He is best known for his participation in four Whitbread Round the World Yacht Races since 1977. In that year at the age of 25 he navigated the British Cutter KINGS LEGEND to 2nd place. In 2002/2003 Skip project managed the construction of his new Pelagic Australis, a 23 meter purpose built expedition vessel for high latitude sailing in order to augment the charter operations of the original Pelagic. Launched in September of 2003 she is the flag ship for Pelagic Expeditions. Pelagic Australis’s skipper since the 2006/2007 season, Stewart and his partner Jessica Hay are on board from September to end of June. Stewart Richardson was born in 1978 and hails from rural Norfolk England where he played cricket, field hockey and participated in athletics at regional level in addition to sailing dinghies on the Norfolk Broads. In 2000 he qualified as a Royal Yachting Association Yachtmaster Offshore Instructor in Southampton and began his professional sailing career focused in UK and northern European waters. A position as RYA instructor took him to Australia in 2002 where he was employed as a senior instructor by Flying Fish PTY LTD in Sydney. For four years he sailed extensively along the east coast of Australia and also made voyages to New Zealand and the Pacific Islands. After returning to the UK in 2005 he participated in various racing campaigns including the Fastnet Race and in 2006 he was hired by Chay Blyth’s Challenge Business as one of their captains and recently skippered two back to back transatlantic races leading amateur sailors. He has sailed more than 90,000 miles. Alec Hazell Alec Hazell, born in 1979, grew up in Falmouth England, sailing on a variety of local boats and diving the many wrecks in the area. Alec has travelled extensively through southern Africa where he qualified as a pilot for light aircraft. Returning to the UK he trained and worked as a commercial diver for a number of marine engineering and salvage companies. Returning to Mozambique in 2001 he ran a game fishing and diving camp for two years. In 2003 he took his RYA Yachtmaster Offshore course in Durban and that same year sailed as first mate on the new Pelagic Australis on her delivery from Cape Town to the Falklands and for her first southern season with skipper Steve Wilkins. In the northern spring of 2004 he helped deliver Pelagic Australis to the UK and then was the first mate on Pelagic Australis’ first northern summer in Norway and Spitsbergen with skipper Rich Haworth. Sailing back south again in September 2004 from the UK to Stanley, he then crewed with Jerome Poncet’s Golden Fleece to South Georgia and the Antarctic Peninsula followed by skippering the original Pelagic for charters in Tierra del Fuego during March and April. In 2005 he was again on board for Greenland during Pelagic Australis’ second Arctic season.
Since then he and his partner Giselle Botha have
been working with Skip on Pelagic Australis for the Cape Town refits during the
southern winter and skippering Pelagic during the summers based from Stanley.
In February and March 2008 they spent two months on
Prion
Island contracted to the South Georgia government as support vessel for a
construction crew to build the
Prion
Island boardwalk through the albatross colony. Richard Haworth Richard Haworth, born 1968, grew up in Sheffield in the north of England. Here a passion for moors and mountains developed. From an early age he was climbing on the gritstone edges and served for many years in the Peak District Mountain Rescue team. In 2003 Richard delivered the new Pelagic Australis to Stanley along with skipper Steve Wilkins, and then skippered her for the 2004 and 2005 Arctic seasons in Spitsbergen and Greenland. In 2007 he set up his own consultancy for polar sailing called High Latitudes, and continues to be a collaborator with Pelagic Expeditions. Richard speaks French and Spanish.
Chuck Gates Chuck Gates, born 1953, was one of the original partners in the PELAGIC project to design, build, and operate a multipurpose expedition sailing vessel in the remote corners of the world. Chuck has participated in a number of Pelagic expeditions and skippered the Pelagic in a variety of settings. Significant projects with Pelagic include a 13,000 mile exploration and diving journey through the remote southwest Pacific during 1989-90, a Tierra Del Fuego / Cape Horn / Beagle Channel expedition in 1994, and the ESPN sponsored expedition to Antarctica, which was the subject of a one hour documentary by the same network in 1996. As a young man, Chuck was one of the most sought after bowmen in the international offshore racing circuit. He has participated in most of the major ocean races on a wide variety of boats, and was a key man in the successful campaign of Aura, winning the World Ocean Racing Championship in 1972-4. He went on to parlay that experience into a professional sailing career as captain, navigator and project manager. Chuck holds a USCG 100 ton unlimited passenger Masters license and has logged over 100,000 sea miles. Chuck also serves as President of RenewAire, LLC, a leading manufacturer of Energy Recovery Ventilators in the US, and is active in a variety of small boat endeavors. His favorite recreational activity is high-wind windsurfing. ![]() Karsten SteinbachKarsten Steinbach, born 1963, lives in the port town of Kiel Germany where he began sailing more than 25 years ago. After outgrowing small boat sailing within the Danish archipelago, cruising and racing destinations on bigger boats included Iceland, North America, the Pacific and Japan. After several trips into the icy waters of Greenland he has concentrated his activities on high latitude sailing. In 2000 he skippered the supporting sailing vessel of Arved Fuchs "Shackleton 2000" adventure that included shadowing the replica of the James Caird during her voyage in the Antarctic Peninsula, the South Shetland Islands and South Georgia. In 2001 he skippered the Pelagic for a 35 day cruise to the Antarctic Peninsula. Karsten holds the German equivalent to the British Yachtmaster Certificate and instructs students of the Academic Sailing Club in Kiel in offshore sailing. Besides sailing to remote destinations and participating in many other outdoor activities, he also finds time to pursue his profession as a commercial airline pilot for a charter company, owned by Lufthansa, which specializes in flights from Germany to southern Europe. He speaks fluent English www.pelagic.co.uk Site Homepage © Pelagic 2003. All rights reserved. |
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