Witnesses support Kendall on crash

By PHIL TAYLOR

Two witness accounts of an accident in which an American boardsailor was critically injured support the statement New Zealand sailor Bruce Kendall gave Greek investigators.

The Herald has obtained an English translation of the Greek investigation file on the collision involving the motorboat Kendall was driving and Kimberly Birkenfeld's sailboard.

Kendall, an Olympic gold and bronze medallist, said Birkenfeld, who was the United States' top-ranked windsurfer, sailed into him.

But Birkenfeld, who 15 months after the accident uses a wheelchair to get about, told the Herald her injuries and damage to her sailboard indicated she was run over while sitting on her board.

New Zealand windsurfer James Wells and German Julia Conrad, 19, who was a passenger on Kendall's boat, said in their statements that the sailboard hit the rear left of the motorboat.

Kendall, 40, was at a regatta at the Olympic sailing venue near Athens in August last year as coach of the New Zealand team.

The Greek file says he was coaching three of his sailors about one nautical mile from the race course.

"I realised that within a few minutes the race was about to begin, and I told my athletes to head for the start point," Kendall's statement says.

He watched his sailors turn and followed them, doing about nine knots.

"Out of the corner of my eye I saw a shadow coming towards me at high speed, at the left side of my craft. I immediately made a manoeuvre to avoid it but the speed of the windsurf board was so high that it hit the back left side of my craft."

Conrad, who said she was behind Kendall on the motorboat, gave a similar account.

Wells, 21, was one of the New Zealand sailors Kendall was coaching. While returning for the race start, he said, he looked and saw Kendall following.

"Then I saw Kimberly's windsurf board heading for our coach's craft and since none of them obviously was not seeing the other [sic], Kimberly's windsurf board collided with the back left of my coach's craft."

The other two New Zealand sailors in the vicinity do not appear to have been identified or interviewed.

Birkenfeld has no recollection of the accident.

Kendall, Wells and Conrad told how Kendall rescued Birkenfeld, who had stopped breathing, gave her artificial respiration and accompanied her in the ambulance.

Birkenfeld, 38, had brain and spinal injuries and was unconscious for 30 days. She spent two months in hospital and is unlikely to fully recover.

She told the Herald it had been assumed her injuries were caused by the motorboat's propeller, but there were no propeller marks on her body.

"My physical injuries indicate I was run over while ... I was not sailing but sitting on my board making final race preparations."

She believes the powerboat hull hit her on the head.

Kendall's father, Tony Kendall, said his son had been advised not to comment about the accident because "of the fear of litigation".

"Unfortunately, Kimberly has no memory and is surmising from a distance as to what happened."

It was difficult to know how to resolve things, Mr Kendall said.

"Ideally, it would be nice to be able to have Bruce sit with Kimberly and go over what happened. Whether she would believe him or whether she would take this as evidence against him, who knows?

"We don't know where she stands in her attitude to suing. That's why we are not saying anything."

Birkenfeld has not ruled out litigation.

She said she had not considered it until several months after the accident when "physical evidence literally began landing on my front doorstep".

This included her sailboard, which she said was damaged in the middle but not in the front, and the translation of the Greek investigation.