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In that moment it dawned on me that everything has to line up perfectly for something to turn out this awful.

Abby Sunderland

The seriousness of my situation started to sink in, and again I fought panic. I pushed it down, but it was harder this time, like my insides were an open can of shaken soda and I was trying to keep it from bubbling up out of the top.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Harder Panic Seriousness Soda Time Trying
Slowly, my brain let me in on the fact that I had just come this close to dying.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Brain Close Dying Fact Slowly
On June 10, the worst storm in the series swept across the middle of the Indian Ocean and Wild Eyes was directly in its path.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Eye June Ocean Strom Swept
I had begun to think that dreams are meant to be no more than dreams and that in reality dreams don’t come true. Then my brother (Zac) left on his trip.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Begun Believe Brother Dream More
The open ocean often takes you past your physical limits and when it does, sailing becomes a mental game.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Game Mental Ocean Past Physical
When I saw the plane, I was absolutely astonished! Two emotions crashed over me: surging joy and crazy fear.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Astonished Crazy Fear Joy Surging Two
One day that same year, I told my dad that someday, I would sail around the world alone.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Alone Around Dad Day One Year
I am twelve thousand miles wiser, twelve thousand miles more resilient, and I have twelve thousand miles more faith in God.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Faith God Mile Resilient Twelve
All the ingenuity, all the high-tech gear, all the jury-rigging sometimes the sea would rip it all away until there was only you, the Creator, and His mercy.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Creator Gear Ingenuity Jury Rigging Rip Sea
The things that happen on the sea take you beyond yourself, beyond human capability.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Capability Human Sea Solo Unassisted Youngest
I will never forget the feeling of walking into my home, a place that while drifting helpless in the middle of the Indian Ocean I wondered if I would ever see again.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Feeling Home Indian Ocean Walking
If a big wave came at the wrong moment, it would sweep me off into forty-eight-degree water, where I might last twenty minutes. Drowning quickly might be better.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Drowning Eight Twenty Water
I’m one-hundred-fifty miles off Cape Horn, both autopilots are broken, and my boat is drifting toward one of the nastiest chunks of ocean on the face of the earth.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Boat Broke Broken Cape Drifting Horn Ocean
But none of that kept me from picturing what a tsunami might look like if it did rise up and roar toward my little boat like some watery blue version of the Great Wall of China.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Blue Boat Little Look Version Wall Watery
There are a number of places on marine charts where even the most weathered sailors point and say, “Right there, nothing can go wrong. Everything has to go right.”
ABBY SUNDERLAND

Marine Number Ocean Plate Right Weathered
One place is the turbulent passage south of Cape Horn. Another is the dead center of the Indian Ocean.
ABBY SUNDERLAND

One Passage Place Point Turbulent

In that moment it dawned on me that everything has to line up perfectly for something to turn out this awful.

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In that moment it dawned on me that everything has to line up perfectly for something to turn out this awful.

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