The Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) has completed its preliminary report into a fatal accident onboard a sailing boat off the Isle of Wight, UK, in August 2025, when a skipper died after being pulled into the rope that was turned around a winch and becoming entangled around the winch drum.
The report by the MAIB said the skipper caught his hand in the rope and was ‘progressively pulled tighter onto the winch drum’. It also notes that the inboard winch had a known intermittent defect to its control switch, which sometimes caused the winch to continue to operate after the control switch had been released.
The accident
The skipper, Lyall Babington, was a 74-year-old New Zealand national who was sailing around the world on his sailing boat, Mollie (pictured). Babington had set off from New Zealand around three years before the incident.
The accident occurred approximately 2.8 nautical miles south‑south-west of the Needles Lighthouse, Isle of Wight, England, on 5 August 2025.
Earlier in the day, Mollie had departed from West Wittering for a passage to Poole with Babington and three crew on board. According to the MAIB report, at around 1100, Mollie was sailing towards Poole and had reached the western Solent. The skipper informed the crew that they needed to raise the storm jib sail to try and improve the upwind progress of the vessel.
To hoist the storm jib sail the halyard was usually taken to a powered winch at the aft of the cockpit where there were a pair of powered 24-volt (V) direct current (DC) winches mounted on a pedestal (Figure 2). The winches were normally operated by pressing the control switches fitted to the pedestal with the user’s knee. Earlier on the day of the accident, the inboard winch had been used to hoist Mollie’s tender and the hoist rope was left turned around the winch.
As the skipper started to clear the hoist rope from the inboard winch it started to turn, and the skipper’s right hand became caught in the rope around it. As the winch continued to turn the skipper was progressively pulled tighter onto the winch drum, causing severe injuries to his arm and hand, trauma to his head and chest, and pinning him around the winch. The crew tried to stop the winch using the control switch. After a number of attempts the winch stopped turning and the crew assessed the skipper for signs of life. The skipper was unresponsive and tightly wound over and around the winch and the crew called the Coastguard and raised a ‘Mayday’ at 1218.
At 1223 and 1229 respectively, the RNLI and rescue helicopter R175 were tasked. Both were on scene by 1249. The RNLI crew boarded the vessel and tried to free the skipper from the winch. As they did so, and without warning, the winch activated and released the skipper and he fell onto the deck. The RNLI crew performed CPR and a paramedic from R175 was lowered onto the vessel. Despite CPR efforts he was declared dead at 1305.
Mollie was taken to Yarmouth, Isle of Wight. A post-mortem examination of the skipper was carried out, the results of which are pending.
The crew
The vessel was Babington’s permanent residence and he had engaged crew in the various ports he visited to assist him with his planned voyage. These crew were unpaid and contributed to their onboard living costs. Two of the crew had joined Mollie the day before the accident, the third crew member had been on and off the vessel for about five months.
Findings
On 6 August 2025, a preliminary assessment was conducted that included examination of the scene, operation of the aft cockpit winches and an inspection of the switches and powering arrangements. The preliminary assessment identified that the inboard winch had a known intermittent defect to its control switch, which sometimes caused the winch to continue to operate after the control switch had been released.
The assessment also noted there was no local emergency stop fitted to the aft winches and no means of isolating the winches from the vessel’s 24V DC power system. To cut power to the winches required isolating the 24V DC system by turning off the batteries in Mollie’s forward cabin.
The MAIB deduces that the powered winch had likely been installed by a small boatyard, and the installation was not mass-produced.
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