Just the two of them aboard, and one of them had never been sailing in her life.   They "insist" that there were storms on the night they set sail, despite the fact that records show the weather was not stormy.  They had several opportunities to correct the problem, but didn't attempt to do so.

It seems to me that the only person with (alleged) open-ocean sailing experience was Appel, and it's pretty clear that her judgment is incredibly ill-suited for sailing of any kind.