Xiamen (CNS) -- The "Xiamen" sailing boat, named after the coastal city of Xiamen in southeast China's Fujian Province, set out for a record-making global voyage from the Xiamen Port, with eight amateur sailors on board, on Thursday afternoon.
The sailors, from 31 to 57 years old, will complete a journey of 23,000 nautical miles and are expected to break several sailing records in China over the next seven months. They will travel from the northwest Pacific to southwest Pacific, from the south Pacific to the south Atlantic, and from the south Indian Ocean to the South China Sea.
It will be the first Chinese boat that sails around the earth, and passes the Cape Horn known as sailors' nightmare and through the notoriously windy Westerlies around 55 degrees latitude in the southern hemisphere.
The crew are fully prepared for the upcoming challenge – both soaring waves and more than 50 days without landing, said Lan Jian, one of the sailors.
The crew received a year of technical training before the voyage and did a trial sail of 2,000 nautical miles from Hong Kong to Qingdao in August.
The boat is equipped with the most advanced devices, including radar, a radio, an automatic recognition system and a satellite position indicator.
Captain Wei Jun said through this expedition they hope to show their passion for sailing, to prove the capabilities of amateur sailors from Xiamen and to raise the public's awareness of protecting the ocean.
