The sailing vessel will have an Indian Navy crew of five officers including two women officers

Indian Navy Sailing Vessel INSV Tarini will participate in the 50th edition of Cape to Rio Race 2023, one of the most prestigious Trans-Atlantic ocean races.

This ocean sailing race will be flagged off from Cape Town on January 2, 2023 and will culminate at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The vessel has already set sail for Cape Town with an an Indian Navy crew of five officers including two women officers, the Ministry of Defence said on Monday.

INSV Tarini is known for circumnavigating the globe with an all women officer crew in the historic expedition titled ‘Navika Sagar Parikrama’ in 2017.

Whilst transiting from Goa to Rio de Janeiro via Cape Town and back during this expedition, INSV Tarini would be covering a distance of almost 17000nm (approx. 30000 km), the Ministry of Defence said.

For the Cape to Rio Race 2023, the vessel will be skippered by Capt Atool Sinha with Lt Cdr Ashutosh Sharma, Lt Cdr Dilna K, Lt Cdr Roopa A and SLt Aviral Keshav as the crew.

The crew, over a period of 5-6 months in this trans-oceanic voyage is expected to face extreme weather and rough sea conditions of the Indian, Atlantic and the Southern oceans.

The expedition aims to train the crew onboard, in essential seamanship skills including Navigation, Communication, Technical, and Planning. The expedition is an important milestone in training of the two women officers onboard for undertaking solo circumnavigation sailing expedition of the globe.

A crew turnaround is planned at Rio de Janeiro for the return leg to India. After this, Cdr Nikhil P Hegde will be taking over as skipper with Cdr MA Zulfikar, Cdr Divya Purohit and Cdr Abhishek Doke as crew.

"Lt Cdr Dilna K and Lt Cdr Roopa A will be part of the crew for both legs of the expedition as they are being trained for solo circumnavigation of the globe by woman officer. Under the same training curriculum these women officers also participated in the recent expedition to Mauritius," the Ministry of Defence said.

The ministry pointed out that ocean sailing is an extremely tough adventure sport. "These Ocean Sailing expeditions help inculcating the spirit of adventure, risk taking abilities whilst also enhancing Indian Navy’s ability to project its benign presence across the globe," the ministry explained.

It is worth noting that the Indian Navy has been regularly participating in sailing expeditions like Sagar Parikrama, IONS 10th anniversary and the Bay of Bengal sailing expeditions.