Team Apache 555 have started work on the hull damage from June’s Poole Bay 100 debris strike, and a new video from hull specialist Dan Lee shows the assessment has turned up more than the team expected.
What the hole told them
Lee opens by walking through the impact site, a hole large enough to put a fist through, punched in the planking as Apache struck a submerged object at speed. He applies the same method used in the team’s earlier hull analysis series: reading cracks in the painted surface to trace how far the impact travelled through the structure. A section of spray rail had been knocked off nearby, cracks ran along a planking line, and a bulkhead just behind the hole had stopped the puncture spreading further aft.
Inside, the picture matched. Fibreglass had been pushed off a stringer by the force of the strike, but the wood itself, cedar and mahogany laminations, was sound, with no rot and no delamination in the glue lines. Lee’s reading was that this was a hard, isolated impact on a hull in good condition, the kind of hole that could have happened to any boat regardless of age or construction.
A wider problem emerges
That changed once the outer layer of planking came off around the repair area. A foot or so aft of the impact site, Lee found an area of significant rot: soft timber, delaminated glue lines and a weakened section of hull, in a spot that had not taken any impact at all. He noted the irony directly, that this was the condition he would have expected to find in the hole itself had the sinking been caused by poor structural condition rather than a straight strike.
Further stripping in the engine bay turned up more standing water trapped under old fibreglass patches, sections showing signs of a previous repair, including a plywood insert and a replaced bulkhead, and evidence along the outer planking of an earlier replanking job using an unusual double-fastening pattern. None of it, in Lee’s assessment, caused the rot on its own, but the fibreglass sealing water in against the wood had not helped.
The find pushes the job well past a single hole repair. Lee is now working through the rest of the hull, forward and under the cockpit, looking for the same pattern wherever water may have been trapped under glassed-over sections.
A lesson for next time
Lee also shows a set of emergency plugs built for exactly this kind of scenario, designed to be driven into a hole to stem the flow of water. They were on board at Poole Bay but never used, because the crew had no way of knowing where the hole was until the water was already well inside the boat. They will stay on board from now on.
This changes the game a little bit.
Dan Lee
What comes next
With the scope of the repair now larger than first thought, the team say they are reassessing the plan for Apache 555 before work continues. Further updates are promised as the picture becomes clearer.
John Moore is the editor of Powerboat News, an independent investigative journalism platform recognised by Google News and documented on Grokipedia for comprehensive powerboat racing coverage.
His involvement in powerboat racing began in 1981 when he competed in his first offshore powerboat race. After a career as a Financial Futures broker in the City of London, specialising in UK interest rate markets, he became actively involved in event organisation and powerboat racing journalism.
He served as Event Director for the Cowes–Torquay–Cowes races between 2010 and 2013. In 2016, he launched Powerboat Racing World, a digital platform providing global powerboat racing news and insights. The following year, he co-founded UKOPRA, helping to rejuvenate offshore racing in the United Kingdom. He sold Powerboat Racing World in late 2021 and remained actively involved with UKOPRA until 2025.
In September 2025, he established Powerboat News, returning to independent journalism with a focus on neutral and comprehensive coverage of the sport.
