THE EVOLUTION OF SURVIVAL
Carlos Burle and Maya Gabeira discuss the Nazare experience
- Published:November 6, 2013
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Maya's wave: "I was looking for something like 50-feet and we
were in this zone where the only waves that broke were over 60-feet."
Photo: Baleixo
Then... controversy. Hawaiian titan Laird Hamilton -- the outspoken
sentinel of super surfing -- called bullshit on the whole thing to CNN,
publically discounting not only Carlos' achievement but Gabeira's very
presence in the lineup. Santa Cruz vet Ken "Skindog" Collins quickly
released a web video in favor of the Brazilians, basically calling bullshit on Laird calling bullshit.
Meanwhile, a recovering Maya is laughing. Because she's not dead after catching the wave of her life. And Carlos is smiling. Because he got everyone out alive -- and the wave of his life.
THE NAZARÉ SITUATION
Carlos: "That place is f--king terrible. That beachbreak... you don't wanna be there, and between the cliffs and the combination of other factors that whole setup is just the worst. My first concern that morning was the wind. I saw on the maps they were gonna change from SE to SW and then N, and we'd have a window that would be amazing. We studied how to tow the wave, but the kick-out that was supposed to be easy wasn't. It was a lot bigger than we thought. I jumped so high on the ski, I lost the radio."
Maya: "Just don't start with, 'Maya drowned.' I'm over that shit. Maybe start the article as 'the biggest wave ever surfed by a woman,' [laughs]. We got to the harbor at dark, and as soon as we drove out we saw swell going into the shorebreak and giant waves breaking way outside the cliff where Garrett got all his huge waves. Garrett was already waiting way outside with his safety support ski next to him. It was glassy and offshore, but as soon as we got to the peak we saw a completely different lineup from what we had been practicing in."
MAYA'S WAVE
Carlos: "At first she didn't want to let go of the rope. She said, 'How about a smaller one?' I said, 'Listen, a small wave today is a big wave. It'd be idiotic to get hurt on a small wave, so let's go for a nice, big one.' It's not hard to find peaks at Nazaré. There's open faces everywhere, it's just hard to find the right one. A big one came right away. It was the second wave of the set but the first one wasn't big enough to clean it up, so the face was bumpy. From what I saw on the jet-ski, she was just jumping and landing. Then she just disappeared."
Maya: "All this happened really fast. It got light at 6:45 and my accident was at 7:15. Carlos fell off the ski driving Gordo [Felipe Cesarano], lost the radio, climbed back on, then drove back with Gordo screaming, 'I've never seen a wave like that! It's giant!' Carlos drove me around for one set and I said, 'Man, I don't know about this.' I was looking for something like 50-feet and we were in this zone where the only waves that broke were over 60-feet. That's when I thought about Teahupo'o and everything I've ever done and made the decision to take the risk and catch one big wave. I stood up, and Garrett stood up, as well, on the inside. That relaxed me, because I realized it was a bomb and Garrett was definitely gonna go. Then I looked back and he was gone. It was mine: the wave of my life. We spoke about always going on the second wave of the set, but it's hard to think like that when you're facing those conditions. I think we were all in the heat of emotion and just going for it. The wave had huge steps, but didn't close out. It was a very defined, perfect peak."
TOUGH BREAK
Maya: "There was no track and, as you can see from the video, I was in the air for quite awhile. I landed that but was going faster with every bump as the wave got bigger. I have a tendency to land on my back foot, which I have to work on. That weakened my stability and on the third bump, I fell. I don't know if I broke my [tibia] by falling wrong or landing wrong; or if I fell, then landed and then broke it in the foot straps; or if it was the impact... It's a mystery. But I didn't even realize I'd broken my leg until I was on the way to the hospital."
THE RESCUE
Carlos: "The current was so strong, pushing her really close to the cliff. I went straight to the shorebreak, saw something, then heard people whistling and found her like this [makes catatonic pose]. I tried to put the sled on her and realized she couldn't move. Then I went for my second turn and missed her -- I think I did the wrong maneuver. I took my hands off the gas and thought, 'Should I go around again or tell her to grab the rope and get her outta this f--king place?' It's hard to drive a ski over there -- water's just moving everywhere, because it breaks so close to the rocks. My first reaction was to tell her to grab the rope, because we only needed to move like 15 meters to the beach. I don't know how she managed to with so little energy, but she grabbed the rope and I pushed the gas really slow while keeping my eye on her until I felt her let the rope go. I turned around and she was already facing down."
Maya: "I got pounded but was okay. I did my breath-holding exercises, exchanged my O2 and CO2, and the second wave of the set -- Eric Rebiere's wave -- got me on the left. I was in the worst possible spot and took it on the head. But I maintained composure, like, 'I have good breath-hold. I'm not gonna freak out.' But this was a long, long, long hold-down. When I came up I didn't have time to think about anything. Next thing I knew I was in the shorebreak with this massive whitewater lip monster just exploding on top of me. My lifejacket got ripped off, everything went black and I knew things went really bad. Carlos looked for me for, like, four minutes."
Carlos: "When she vanished I got really scared. But I think it was a good reaction to not move too much. I kept myself in the same place, saying, 'she's gonna come up, she's gonna come up...' When she did I didn't think twice. I jumped from the ski and grabbed any piece of her I could... hair, whatever. I was touching the sand with waves hitting me and going backwards with her in the surge. I was using the tide, braking, then walking with her weight and the wave. On the beach, we did CPR and she started breathing. She threw up a lot of water, because she had been facing down for one or two minutes."
Maya: "I think it's one type of sensation when you fail on oxygen, but it's another thing blacking out from a strong impact. I had no lifejacket and had no clue where I was. As soon as I opened my eyes everything went white, and I knew it was the impact. I was confused, in a lot of pain and knew my body was damaged somehow. I could hear this buzzing in my ears, looked at the left and could see the cliffs getting closer and thought, 'I'm f--ked.' Then I looked at the right and that's when I made eye contact with Carlos. Everything from then on was survival mode. He came in hot and hit me with the sled because I wasn't capable of getting on it. I tried to stay calm and put my arms up so he could see me. We missed each other the second try, he stopped the ski and I heard his voice. I was conscious of the danger at the moment, which was the cliff. If I drifted there, I was gonna die. So I was still functioning, in a weird way, and needed to give Carlos a chance to save me. I knew he wasn't gonna give up, but I had to do my part and put everything I had into grabbing the rope. At the same time as I was saving myself I was also drowning myself because I couldn't hold my face up behind the ski. There was so much water, I completely blacked out. But I knew if my body floated, he would have four minutes to get me out of the water and bring me back to life."
THE REVIVAL
Maya: "I remember my first grasp of air, the wet Nazare sand, looking up at the cloudy sky, and Nuno Oliveira, the lifeguard. I had all this water and foam in my mouth, so I knew exactly what had happened. I'm not gonna lie -- it hurt like hell to come back. It hurt to breathe, I had so much water in me. It's not easy to endure a situation like that: I got a lot of waves on the head, knocked out by the shorebreak, my lifejacket got ripped off me and I had a broken foot. They took me to the fire station, then the nearest hospital, before transferring me to intensive care, where I had to stay 24 hours."
CARLOS' WAVE
Carlos: "People started going back through the channel and Garrett was talking to the Portuguese Navy, who said, 'We're closing the harbor. It's getting too big, messy and dangerous. The rain's coming and it's time for you guys to go back.' I asked him, 'Please, just one. After everything that's happened, I don't wanna let this day pass me by without getting one wave.' They let Scooby take me out. By studying and surfing the wave a little before that day, I knew it's just an A-frame, so if you run too much for the shoulder it doesn't look nice. I went right but did two little turns toward the left, then when I got to the bottom I felt the foam really close to me and pushed a little to the right. I remember Garrett telling me, 'The right's much easier and safer because you're gonna get pushed by the currents to the channel.' But I was going straight toward the rocks on this monster. So when I felt the second push that was gonna be much stronger I didn't try to hold on. I just kicked the board away, like, 'I'm gonna take this beating but I'm not going into those rocks.' And you know what happened? The bottom disappeared and the board went straight to the beach next to the cliffs. I didn't see the whole session, so I didn't know I had the biggest wave. I was out for two hours, and everything went so fast that day. I was just happy to be able to surf, because to tell you the truth it could've been anyone else."
LAIRD'S REACTION
Maya: "I don't have too many thoughts about that. Look, I get criticized quite often. I would've loved to have him criticize me more throughout my career and hear what he thinks about my boards or my training. I never had that opportunity, but going into this point of my life, I don't agree with him. I respect Laird as an athlete, but if he were there -- or if he knew me a little better -- maybe I would take his criticism a little more seriously."
Carlos: "I like that he took a little bit of his time to talk about us. At first, some people got a bit upset with him. But I said to them, 'This is great! I hope everybody in the world starts to talk about us.' As a professional, I think it's good to hear other comments, and Laird is somebody who everybody else watches what he says or does. He's a great waterman and an incredible athlete with a lot of skills. I grew up watching him do all these amazing things, and I'm still gonna admire him for the rest of my life. But to give an opinion that I could properly absorb or digest, he would've had to have been there. He doesn't know the wave, and he doesn't know the environment."
AND NOW...
Carlos: "Big-wave surfers are limited on improving their performance because of the lack of environment to do it in. So we have to surf as much as possible when we have that opportunity. I was scared of seeing Maya at the hospital for the first time. I didn't know what her reaction would be. She said, 'I feel so good that I went for that wave, Carlos. Thank you very much. I was dying but I was happy, because I was doing something I love.' I got so emotional I started crying. That was the wave of her life. Then she was like, 'How many months?' ... 'Can I see the footage?' She's psyched! Though we cannot repeat that situation ever again, now Maya knows what it feels like to surf an 80-foot face. That made me happy."
Maya: "I don't think many people ever thought a woman would let go of the rope on a wave like that at 7:15 in the morning. I think we needed footage of somebody almost drowning and going through all that for people to realize how dangerous this is, so hopefully they'll invest more in technology and safety. Many amazing athletes have been inured in tough conditions and big surf, but every time it happens we take a little step forward to better protect the athletes. In this case, it was so well documented that many people got emotional and could feel our struggle to survive these conditions. If we had a second or third ski, a lifejacket that doesn't rip off, or a wetsuit that can take impacts... Carlos and I are at the top of our sport, and we don't have access to that! We train our whole life and once we see an 80-foot wave, if we don't have a second ski, are we just supposed to let this one go? Our rescue wasn't perfect, but we're here to evolve and improve. I'm only human, and in this situation I could've died, but from what I can see, there's no reason why I should've died. More than just my training, my abilities, Carlos, or Nuno Oliveira, there was something bigger at work that gave me the opportunity to come back. We know the risk; we just need to minimize it. At some point somebody has to do it, and it becomes clear what kind of investment is needed to take that risk. There's so much we can learn from this experience. That's my priority now. Because there's no way I'm gonna stop riding big waves."
Meanwhile, a recovering Maya is laughing. Because she's not dead after catching the wave of her life. And Carlos is smiling. Because he got everyone out alive -- and the wave of his life.
THE NAZARÉ SITUATION
Carlos: "That place is f--king terrible. That beachbreak... you don't wanna be there, and between the cliffs and the combination of other factors that whole setup is just the worst. My first concern that morning was the wind. I saw on the maps they were gonna change from SE to SW and then N, and we'd have a window that would be amazing. We studied how to tow the wave, but the kick-out that was supposed to be easy wasn't. It was a lot bigger than we thought. I jumped so high on the ski, I lost the radio."
Maya: "Just don't start with, 'Maya drowned.' I'm over that shit. Maybe start the article as 'the biggest wave ever surfed by a woman,' [laughs]. We got to the harbor at dark, and as soon as we drove out we saw swell going into the shorebreak and giant waves breaking way outside the cliff where Garrett got all his huge waves. Garrett was already waiting way outside with his safety support ski next to him. It was glassy and offshore, but as soon as we got to the peak we saw a completely different lineup from what we had been practicing in."
MAYA'S WAVE
Carlos: "At first she didn't want to let go of the rope. She said, 'How about a smaller one?' I said, 'Listen, a small wave today is a big wave. It'd be idiotic to get hurt on a small wave, so let's go for a nice, big one.' It's not hard to find peaks at Nazaré. There's open faces everywhere, it's just hard to find the right one. A big one came right away. It was the second wave of the set but the first one wasn't big enough to clean it up, so the face was bumpy. From what I saw on the jet-ski, she was just jumping and landing. Then she just disappeared."
Maya: "All this happened really fast. It got light at 6:45 and my accident was at 7:15. Carlos fell off the ski driving Gordo [Felipe Cesarano], lost the radio, climbed back on, then drove back with Gordo screaming, 'I've never seen a wave like that! It's giant!' Carlos drove me around for one set and I said, 'Man, I don't know about this.' I was looking for something like 50-feet and we were in this zone where the only waves that broke were over 60-feet. That's when I thought about Teahupo'o and everything I've ever done and made the decision to take the risk and catch one big wave. I stood up, and Garrett stood up, as well, on the inside. That relaxed me, because I realized it was a bomb and Garrett was definitely gonna go. Then I looked back and he was gone. It was mine: the wave of my life. We spoke about always going on the second wave of the set, but it's hard to think like that when you're facing those conditions. I think we were all in the heat of emotion and just going for it. The wave had huge steps, but didn't close out. It was a very defined, perfect peak."
TOUGH BREAK
Maya: "There was no track and, as you can see from the video, I was in the air for quite awhile. I landed that but was going faster with every bump as the wave got bigger. I have a tendency to land on my back foot, which I have to work on. That weakened my stability and on the third bump, I fell. I don't know if I broke my [tibia] by falling wrong or landing wrong; or if I fell, then landed and then broke it in the foot straps; or if it was the impact... It's a mystery. But I didn't even realize I'd broken my leg until I was on the way to the hospital."
THE RESCUE
Carlos: "The current was so strong, pushing her really close to the cliff. I went straight to the shorebreak, saw something, then heard people whistling and found her like this [makes catatonic pose]. I tried to put the sled on her and realized she couldn't move. Then I went for my second turn and missed her -- I think I did the wrong maneuver. I took my hands off the gas and thought, 'Should I go around again or tell her to grab the rope and get her outta this f--king place?' It's hard to drive a ski over there -- water's just moving everywhere, because it breaks so close to the rocks. My first reaction was to tell her to grab the rope, because we only needed to move like 15 meters to the beach. I don't know how she managed to with so little energy, but she grabbed the rope and I pushed the gas really slow while keeping my eye on her until I felt her let the rope go. I turned around and she was already facing down."
Maya: "I got pounded but was okay. I did my breath-holding exercises, exchanged my O2 and CO2, and the second wave of the set -- Eric Rebiere's wave -- got me on the left. I was in the worst possible spot and took it on the head. But I maintained composure, like, 'I have good breath-hold. I'm not gonna freak out.' But this was a long, long, long hold-down. When I came up I didn't have time to think about anything. Next thing I knew I was in the shorebreak with this massive whitewater lip monster just exploding on top of me. My lifejacket got ripped off, everything went black and I knew things went really bad. Carlos looked for me for, like, four minutes."
Carlos: "When she vanished I got really scared. But I think it was a good reaction to not move too much. I kept myself in the same place, saying, 'she's gonna come up, she's gonna come up...' When she did I didn't think twice. I jumped from the ski and grabbed any piece of her I could... hair, whatever. I was touching the sand with waves hitting me and going backwards with her in the surge. I was using the tide, braking, then walking with her weight and the wave. On the beach, we did CPR and she started breathing. She threw up a lot of water, because she had been facing down for one or two minutes."
Maya: "I think it's one type of sensation when you fail on oxygen, but it's another thing blacking out from a strong impact. I had no lifejacket and had no clue where I was. As soon as I opened my eyes everything went white, and I knew it was the impact. I was confused, in a lot of pain and knew my body was damaged somehow. I could hear this buzzing in my ears, looked at the left and could see the cliffs getting closer and thought, 'I'm f--ked.' Then I looked at the right and that's when I made eye contact with Carlos. Everything from then on was survival mode. He came in hot and hit me with the sled because I wasn't capable of getting on it. I tried to stay calm and put my arms up so he could see me. We missed each other the second try, he stopped the ski and I heard his voice. I was conscious of the danger at the moment, which was the cliff. If I drifted there, I was gonna die. So I was still functioning, in a weird way, and needed to give Carlos a chance to save me. I knew he wasn't gonna give up, but I had to do my part and put everything I had into grabbing the rope. At the same time as I was saving myself I was also drowning myself because I couldn't hold my face up behind the ski. There was so much water, I completely blacked out. But I knew if my body floated, he would have four minutes to get me out of the water and bring me back to life."
THE REVIVAL
Maya: "I remember my first grasp of air, the wet Nazare sand, looking up at the cloudy sky, and Nuno Oliveira, the lifeguard. I had all this water and foam in my mouth, so I knew exactly what had happened. I'm not gonna lie -- it hurt like hell to come back. It hurt to breathe, I had so much water in me. It's not easy to endure a situation like that: I got a lot of waves on the head, knocked out by the shorebreak, my lifejacket got ripped off me and I had a broken foot. They took me to the fire station, then the nearest hospital, before transferring me to intensive care, where I had to stay 24 hours."
CARLOS' WAVE
Carlos: "People started going back through the channel and Garrett was talking to the Portuguese Navy, who said, 'We're closing the harbor. It's getting too big, messy and dangerous. The rain's coming and it's time for you guys to go back.' I asked him, 'Please, just one. After everything that's happened, I don't wanna let this day pass me by without getting one wave.' They let Scooby take me out. By studying and surfing the wave a little before that day, I knew it's just an A-frame, so if you run too much for the shoulder it doesn't look nice. I went right but did two little turns toward the left, then when I got to the bottom I felt the foam really close to me and pushed a little to the right. I remember Garrett telling me, 'The right's much easier and safer because you're gonna get pushed by the currents to the channel.' But I was going straight toward the rocks on this monster. So when I felt the second push that was gonna be much stronger I didn't try to hold on. I just kicked the board away, like, 'I'm gonna take this beating but I'm not going into those rocks.' And you know what happened? The bottom disappeared and the board went straight to the beach next to the cliffs. I didn't see the whole session, so I didn't know I had the biggest wave. I was out for two hours, and everything went so fast that day. I was just happy to be able to surf, because to tell you the truth it could've been anyone else."
LAIRD'S REACTION
Maya: "I don't have too many thoughts about that. Look, I get criticized quite often. I would've loved to have him criticize me more throughout my career and hear what he thinks about my boards or my training. I never had that opportunity, but going into this point of my life, I don't agree with him. I respect Laird as an athlete, but if he were there -- or if he knew me a little better -- maybe I would take his criticism a little more seriously."
Carlos: "I like that he took a little bit of his time to talk about us. At first, some people got a bit upset with him. But I said to them, 'This is great! I hope everybody in the world starts to talk about us.' As a professional, I think it's good to hear other comments, and Laird is somebody who everybody else watches what he says or does. He's a great waterman and an incredible athlete with a lot of skills. I grew up watching him do all these amazing things, and I'm still gonna admire him for the rest of my life. But to give an opinion that I could properly absorb or digest, he would've had to have been there. He doesn't know the wave, and he doesn't know the environment."
AND NOW...
Carlos: "Big-wave surfers are limited on improving their performance because of the lack of environment to do it in. So we have to surf as much as possible when we have that opportunity. I was scared of seeing Maya at the hospital for the first time. I didn't know what her reaction would be. She said, 'I feel so good that I went for that wave, Carlos. Thank you very much. I was dying but I was happy, because I was doing something I love.' I got so emotional I started crying. That was the wave of her life. Then she was like, 'How many months?' ... 'Can I see the footage?' She's psyched! Though we cannot repeat that situation ever again, now Maya knows what it feels like to surf an 80-foot face. That made me happy."
Maya: "I don't think many people ever thought a woman would let go of the rope on a wave like that at 7:15 in the morning. I think we needed footage of somebody almost drowning and going through all that for people to realize how dangerous this is, so hopefully they'll invest more in technology and safety. Many amazing athletes have been inured in tough conditions and big surf, but every time it happens we take a little step forward to better protect the athletes. In this case, it was so well documented that many people got emotional and could feel our struggle to survive these conditions. If we had a second or third ski, a lifejacket that doesn't rip off, or a wetsuit that can take impacts... Carlos and I are at the top of our sport, and we don't have access to that! We train our whole life and once we see an 80-foot wave, if we don't have a second ski, are we just supposed to let this one go? Our rescue wasn't perfect, but we're here to evolve and improve. I'm only human, and in this situation I could've died, but from what I can see, there's no reason why I should've died. More than just my training, my abilities, Carlos, or Nuno Oliveira, there was something bigger at work that gave me the opportunity to come back. We know the risk; we just need to minimize it. At some point somebody has to do it, and it becomes clear what kind of investment is needed to take that risk. There's so much we can learn from this experience. That's my priority now. Because there's no way I'm gonna stop riding big waves."
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