I am forced this week to acknowledge the efforts of 44 year old Florida Man, Reza Baluchi ....
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| Reza Baluchi And An Earlier 'Bubble' Vessel |
... to enter the Florida Man hall of fame by way of sheer persistence.
Yep, you have probably read this week (but it bares repeating) about his interception by the US Coast Guard about 70 miles (110km) off Tybee Island, Georgia, on the 26th of August. He was attempting to "run to London" across the Atlantic Ocean, in a homemade vessel resembling a hamster wheel that he calls 'the bubble'.
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| The Latest Version Of The 'Bubble'. |
The 'marathon runner' had hoped to successfully run his sea vessel, the 3,450 miles (5552.24 km / 2997.97 nautical miles), by means of rotating paddles, driven by his running up one side (like a hamster does) .... the US Coast Guard officers determined that Mr Baluchi was conducting a 'manifestly unsafe voyage', and stopped him.
But when challenged by the US Coast Guard, he simply refused to leave the vessel for three days, and even threatened to kill himself with a bomb that he claimed that he had on board. Eventually on the 1st of September, he surrendered to the coast guard and was taken into custody .... there was of course no bomb.
Mr Baluchi has previous form for this kind of stupidity having tried three similar voyages before .... all of which ended in Coast Guard interventions:
- In 2014, he was rescued from a similar contraption near St Augustine.
- In 2016, he was once again rescued off the coast of Jupiter, near Palm Beach in Florida.
- In 2021, he was finally arrested, after again being rescued while trying to run his vessel from Florida to New York, this time after he was found drifting 30 miles south of his departure point.
He has previously claimed that he was trying to raise money for various causes, including ironically the coast guard. He told WOFL-TV in Orlando in 2021 that "My goal is to not only raise money for homeless people, raise money for the Coast Guard, raise money for the police department, raise money for the fire department. They are in public service, they do it for safety, and they help other people."
He perhaps should have included mental health services in that list .... He is now facing federal charges of obstruction of a boarding, and violation of a Captain of the Port order.
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