Sailing along with 10 people aboard, dum de dum de dum. Suddenly, CRACK! CRASH! Sails all over us! The boom falls onto the cabin top right next to us! The mast crashes into the water! Cables everywhere!

Thanks to Cynthia Rauschert for the photos from that night.

continues the Free Yacht saga begun at How to Get a Free Yacht

Here's the table of contents of the whole saga:
Chapter 1: How to Get a Free Yacht
Chapter 2: Maiden Voyage of the Free Yacht
Chapter 3: Fix Broken Stix and other Trix
Chapter 4: Outboard Motor Mutilates Foot
Chapter 5: It's sinking and it's on Fire.
Chapter 6: How To Give Away a Free Yacht
Chapter 7: Get an Even Better One and Fabulize it.
Chapter 8: Celebrate Freedom
Chapter 9: Technicolor Dreamboat
Chapter 10: Privateer Knot
Chapter 11: Dismasted!
Chapter 12: Kiteboat!
Chapter 13: Mast Raising!

Step 1: The View From the Cockpit

The mast is in the water, the boom fell to the deck. Shannon and I were sitting on the lee side talking about geopolitics and Cheez Whiz.. We had to crawl out from under the sail. Fortunately everyone else was on the windward side and no one was hit or tangled.
The sails in the water filled with water and slowly dragged more stuff over the side.
What a mess. How could all that crap do that and not hurt anyone? We got lucky.

Step 2: Gus' Narrative Part 1

photos: Gus, Dav and Tim out on the lee float trying to decipher tangled cables and unhook the sails.

Captain Gus Holcomb writes:
Subject: :(

Well, Last night didn't go well. Everyone is thankfully ok, but Solara was
demasted last night in the bay.

On the way back from a Red Rock sight seeing trip the wind picked up to
20-25. We were close hauled and heading to TI. We were sailing fast, but the
boat felt balanced. The starboard ama was skipping the surface of the water.
I didn't feel like we were overpowered; Modest weather-helm.

Not sure what happened first, but one of the stays pulled free and the mast
shattered about 1/4 of the way up.
Gus' email continues on next step...

Step 3: Gus' Narrative Part 2

Gus: Everything blew off the deck and into the
drink. After that little surprise we anchored and assessed the situation.
Tim was pretty gungho to jump in the water and swim to shore, but we tied
him to the mizzen mast and got to work. We untied everything we could and
detached all of the stays except the headstay.

Tim: Here's the view to lee of the boat. Mast, sails, and a mess of cables in the water.
We're anchored but the mast won't swing aft. Something snagged on its broken butt won't let it swing.

Step 4: Gus' Narrative Part 3

Gus: Everything was tangled up around the top half of the mast and half
under the boat, so after Tim pushed
all the sails back into the water, we managed to float the mast alongside
the boat and haul it onboard.

Tim: In this photo the mast is starting to swing aft. We've disconnected enough stuff to unsnag it but not enough to lose anything.

Step 5: Gus' Narrative Part 4

Gus: We pulled it all on deck and fished around
with the boat hook for loose lines.

After consolation budweisers all around we pull anchor and motored back to
the marina.

For such a catastrophic failure, it went more smoothly than I could have
hoped. No one was hurt, which is the most important thing, but everyone
remained calm and we worked together to get us back to shore safely.

But today is a new day and I heard mention of an aluminum mast stashed away.
I'm looking forward to working on her with you all and getting her ship
shape in time for a run to the farallones later on this summer.

gus

Tim: Here's everyone heaving the mast onto the deck and piling the sails together. As you can see, morale is high. Everyone on board was a good sport, and it turned out to be one of the most enjoyable (and memorable) cruises yet!

Step 6: The Next Morning...

In the bright sunlight of May the 14th, here's the mess we had on deck. Everything was snarled with everything else. The jagged stub of the mast stabbed through our new jib when it fell. There was a big rip in the main and all the battens were broken.

Step 7: Cleaner and Lighter

It took some doing to straighten out all that stuff and haul it off the boat.
Afterward the boat floated a LOT higher. All that hardware and cloth is pretty heavy.
Notice our new waterlines.