| GEO World | | UK sailors released by Iran return to Britain | Updated at: 1915 PST, Friday, December 04, 2009
 LONDON: A group of yachtsmen held briefly by Iran after their boat crossed into Iranian waters returned to Britain on Friday.
Smiling and looking relaxed, Oliver Smith, Oliver Young, SamUsher and Luke Porter arrived at London's Heathrow Airport after a six-hour flight from Dubai. A fifth man, David Bloomer, a Bahrain-based radio journalist, did not join the men on their return flight.
Asked what he planned now that he was home, Porter said: “Probably go to the pub.''
The men's boat, the “King of Bahrain,” had been heading to join the 360-mile (580-kilometer) Dubai-Muscat Offshore Sailing Race when it drifted into Iranian waters and was seized by the elite Revolutionary Guard's navy on Nov. 25.
Speaking at Heathrow as the sailors arrived, the chairman of group running the boat, Andrew Pindar, said the sailors were very embarrassed by the whole incident.
“The first thing they said was 'sorry for giving people gray hairs,''' he said. Still, Smith said the sailors can't wait to get back into a boat and go back to the Persian Gulf. |  |
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