AN adventurer bidding to set a new record for surviving on an inhospitable outpost in the Atlantic has abandoned his efforts for this year.
Chartered surveyor Nick Hancock, from Edinburgh, had planned to stay on Rockall, which is 100ft wide and 70ft high, for 60 days.
However, he has been forced to concede defeat before even setting foot on the islet as the high seas running 250 miles west of the Outer Hebrides proved too great a hazard.
Mr Hancock, 38, from Ratho, had planned to live in a converted water bowser bolted on to the rock to beat the 40 days British adventurer and former SAS soldier Tom McClean spent on the rock in 1985, and the 42 days set by three Greenpeace activists in 1997.
He said: "It was always going to be about the weather. We knew the swell may be a deciding factor, and in the end it was."
Mr Hancock first tried to land on Friday. He arrived at the rock about 1am, after having left Leverburgh on Harris at 11.30 the previous morning.
The boat that had taken him out circled for a couple of hours, waiting for first light then moved in close to the rock as dawn broke, to check conditions which were not good.
He said: "The swell ebbed and flowed, hitting exactly the point where I would have to jump, hurtling three or four metres up the side of the rock – well above the usual safety mark – and then plunging four or five metres into a deep hole below the step.
"This created a potential fall of almost 10 metres on to the skirt of rock around the base of Rockall – before being able to reach safety –and a hole into which a RIB, its crew and any kit on board would be sucked, flipped and then scraped back up the rock face."
He continued: "Angus Smith, the skipper, made it clear he was not happy about me leaving the Orca to attempt a landing in these conditions, nor was he keen to endanger his crew on the RIBs."
Mr Hancock said Rockall would be there for another attempt, another day. He thanked his sponsors and all the support he had been given.
"I couldn't have got to this point without the help of a huge number of people," he said.
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