Jemma and Jeremy Cooper were headed to New Zealand from Fiji when a whale crashed into their 52-foot yacht, damaged a rudder and left the vessel disabled.
For more than 18 hours on Sept. 26, the Coopers and two crew members were stranded in the South Pacific Ocean before they were rescued.
“Our home for the last three months disappeared under the surface,” said Ms. Cooper, who lives in Melbourne, Australia, with her husband.
The Coopers had spent three months exploring Fiji, where they assembled a crew for the next leg of their travels. They found one member while kite-surfing and another through a mutual friend.
The group set sail on the yacht — named Tai Tam — from Nadi, a city in Fiji. They anticipated reaching their destination, the port city of Opua in New Zealand, about 1,100 nautical miles away, in about six to eight days.
On the fourth day on their journey and after about 600 nautical miles, near-perfect sailing conditions prevailed.
It appeared that smooth waters were ahead after challenging conditions — choppy waves and gusty winds — dominated the start of the trip.
Ms. Cooper, 57, was steering when she heard a huge thud and was thrown to the port side. The ship’s wheel locked. Ms. Cooper said she could not move it.
“I looked out to the port side, and along with the other members, we saw a pod of whales,” she said, adding that about six to eight sperm whales were gliding away.
A rudder had been jammed, Mr. Cooper, 59, said. Several holes and cracks appeared on the yacht’s starboard side, and water began pouring in.
Mr. Cooper radioed a distress call, and the quartet scrambled to make repairs.
“I never felt like my life was in danger,” said Terry Hetherington, a crew member. “It was like, game on.”
Ms. Cooper and Mr. Hetherington used bilge pumps and bailed water themselves, and Martin Jaffré, a carpenter and crew member, said that he and Mr. Cooper had tried to make repairs with silicone, silica, epoxy and other materials.
“I think I’ve gotten more chance to win the lottery than getting hit by a whale,” Mr. Hetherington, 58, said.
By around 6 p.m., the bilge pumps, after hours of operating, were not performing adequately, and water kept pouring in, Mr. Hetherington said.
The pumps had also become clogged with debris.
“It was now impossible to fix the situation,” Mr. Jaffré, 28, said.
The ship’s bow began to sink as the water rose to about knee-deep in the main cabin.
The closest land was about 200 nautical miles away, Mr. Cooper said.
“It was a matter of time for how long we could keep the boat afloat for,” Mr. Hetherington said.
Those aboard launched an orange, tentlike life raft and a small inflatable tender and abandoned Tai Tam. The moon cast a glow against the dark waters rippling against their life raft as they waited to be rescued.
Maritime New Zealand’s Rescue Coordination Center said it received an alert from an emergency distress beacon that transmitted the yacht’s coordinates.
Flight Lt. Stuart Glendinning of the Royal New Zealand Air Force flew a P-8A Poseidon with a 16-member crew as part of a search-and-rescue mission and circled above the group for hours.
Lt. Glendinning radioed for ships in the area.
A private vessel, Supreme, and a container ship, M.V. Sofrana Surville, which was coming from more than 100 nautical miles away, agreed to help, he said.
Those who had been aboard the Tai Tam spent the night and the early morning on their raft, adrenaline pumping and wide awake.
Crew members aboard the Sofrana Surville tossed a rope ladder to those in the raft. Ms. Cooper said she had burst into tears, from both relief and sadness, when she climbed aboard.
As the sun was rising, Tai Tam dipped and sank into the Pacific Ocean.
The yacht was named after a bay in Hong Kong where the couple met more than 30 years ago while sailing.
The Coopers did not save any part of Tai Tam, which they had sailed for as many as 20,000 nautical miles, Mr. Cooper said.
“I said to Jemma, ‘Just look away,’” he said.
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