I’m afraid, yes. :).
A 16 year-old can be killed just as dead (to coin a phrase) by doing something that looks to most as a safer activity. Sadly, I can guarentee that this summer a 16 year old will die in UK from horseback riding, drowning or a motor vehicle accident.
Risk is a realtive thing. Is a well-trained sailor (albeit a young well-trained sailor) at much more risk than a less experienced adult sailing closer it Britain?
My money would be on this girl, in a properly equipped vessel with all the rescue gear necessary in the Indian ocean as opposed to a less experienced 16 year old in a dinghy off Lands End, the Channel or a loch in Scotland.
I believe a 16 year old can quit school in the UK…and make many other “adult” choices and activities (how’s that for a euphemism? :D) so I’m not sure how sailing or horseback riding, riding a motorbike, racing carts or flying a glider is any different.
I’m sure most parents aren’t going to send a child on a trip like this unless they’re sure of her safety to handle problems…which this girl seems to have done.
And unlike “pressuring” a child into acting or singing, (which would likely have more long term psychological harm) I don’t think there is a lot of money to be earned by sailing around the world. If it weren’t for this emergency, very few people would have known she was doing it. Hardly the stuff of a lucrative book or film deal. More like a few chat shows or a cover of a yachting magazine.
Imagine the good an adventure like this will do for a young person’s self confidence…
Sure there’s a risk, but to re-use a chiche, there’s a risk in doing anything and nothing.
There’s no guarantee that she…or any of us…won’t be diagnosed with cancer next week.
There is a time for governments to be the big nanny…
I’m really not sure this is one of them considering the age and training of the girl.
I understand what you are saying, but the bottom line is would you allow your daughter at 16 to sail solo around the world?
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