They were forced to cover the cockpit with its clear shell, rolling up out of the decking and over to the other side. Under its waterproof cover they were immediately warmer, which was a comfort. It was going to be a true howler, Kasei Vallis serving as a conduit for an extremely powerful blast of air; the AI listed wind speeds at Santorini Island fluctuating between 180 and 220 kilometers an hour, winds which would not diminish much in speed as they crossed the gulf. Certainly it was still a very strong wind, 160 kilometers an hour at the masthead; the surface of the water was disintegrating now, crests flattened by gusts, torn apart. The ship was shutting down in response to all that, mast retracting, cockpit covered, hatches battening; then the sea anchor went out, a tube of material like a wind sock, dragging underwater upwind of them, slowing their drift to leeward, and mitigating the jarring impacts against small icebergs that were becoming more frequent as they all clustered against the lee shore. Now with the sea anchor in place, it was the brash ice and bergy bergs that were floating downwind faster than they were, and knocking against the windward hull, even as the leeward hull still slammed against a thickening ice mass. Both hulls were mostly underwater; in effect the boat was becoming a kind of submarine, lying at the surface and just under it. The strength of the materials of the boat could sustain any shock that even a howler and a lee shore of icebergs could deliver; indeed they could sustain forces several magnitudes stronger. But the weak point, as Sax reflected as he was thrown hard against his seat belt and shoulder harness, holding grimly to the tiller and his seatback, was their bodies. The catamaran lifted on a swell, dropped with a sickening swoop, crashed to a halt against a big berg; and he slammed breathlessly into the restraints. It seemed they might be in danger of being shaken to death, an unpleasant way to go, as he was beginning to understand. Internal organs damaged by seat belts; but if they freed themselves they would be flung around the cockpit, into each other or into something sharp, until something broke or burst. No. It was not a tenable situation. Possibly the restraints he had seen on his bed’s frame would be gentler, but the decelerations when the boat struck the ice mass were so abrupt that he doubted being horizontal would help much.