The Black Pearl

When one of the most spectacular yachts in the world parks up at your local windsurfing spot, then it really would be rude not to go check it out, especially when it’s blowing 30 knots! Scotty Stallman, Kevin Greenslade and Si Pettifer blasted out into Weymouth harbour to check out the incredible “Black Pearl”, while Andy Stallman captured the action from a R.I.B. Read on for more about the yacht and what the Weymouth slalom posse made of it!

- Scotty Stallman, Si Pettifer And Kevin Greenslade

THE BLACK PEARL

Owned by Russian millionaire Oleg Burlakov, at 106 metres in length, the “Black Pearl”, is one of the largest superyachts in the world and reportedly cost $200 million to build. Burlakov has a number of business interests including banking and oil and gas and is worth up to $1 billion on paper, so he had no problems funding the building of the impressive Black Pearl, which was named to pay homage to the movie, The Pirates of the Caribbean.

The Black Pearl was built in Oceanco shipyard in Rotterdam and launched in 2016. It has three self-rotating carbon masts, all seventy metres high (around the height of a 15-storey building), each boasting six sails totalling 2877 m. The sails can be opened or furled at the touch of a button in seven minutes and when fully deployed there are no gaps between the sails, creating a single hugely efficient panel to capture the wind. The sails are trimmed by rotating the masts. As there is no rigging, the masts and yards can be rotated without restriction for all points of sail, making Black Pearl a capable upwind clipper.