By Russell Leadbetter THE Glasgow Clipper crew member who was swept overboard off the South African coast today told how he thought he was going to die.

David Jack spent 10 agonising minutes in the water after being pitched into the sea during a 2am headsail change in winds of force six or seven.

He was at the bow of the 68ft yacht at the time - and at first no-one knew he was overboard.

Once they realised what had happened, they immediately pressed the Man Overboard button on the yacht's GPS system to mark David's position on the chart.

Despite fearing the worst at one stage, David was pulled to safety after 10 minutes and treated on board by a colleague who is a qualified surgeon.

Hannah Jenner, skipper of the Glasgow yacht, which finished third in the gruelling 10-month round-the-world race, said the incident "had been the worst night of her life, and the crew's life as well".

But David, 42, of Kirkintilloch, was left none the worse for his experience - and it has even led to romance with a member of a rival Clipper crew.

The Glasgow yacht was leading the rest of the fleet at the time of the incident, last November, and was heading from Durban, South Africa, to Fremantle in western Australia - a journey of more than 4000 nautical miles.

In his first interview about the incident, David, a marine engineer who completed three of the race's seven legs, said it had happened when he was trying to bring down a sail.

"All the safety elements were involved," he said.

"I was clipped on and had my life-jacket on.

"Then a wave came and knocked me over. The rest of my crew-mates didn't know I was over at the time, and I was underneath the sail.

"So I was all ready to cut my line, but I didn't bother as the guy turned the boat round for me and pulled the sail up, and I came up underneath the sail."

David was grabbed by his life-jacket and two male colleagues tried to haul him on board.

"With that, my life-jacket came right off and I was just left in the water, thinking that was it - life ended.

"I kept my eye on the boat and took my big oil-jacket and kicked my sea boots off.

"I just treaded water and hoped that it would come back quicker than it had during the last man-overboard training exercise we had had, when it took a long time to go back.

"At one point I didn't think I was going to make it. I really didn't.

"You start to see your life flashing past you. My father passed away about eight years ago and I saw a picture of his face coming back.

"It really was very close, I think - I'm a very lucky man.

"Within 10 minutes the boat came back. Hannah, who was absolutely fantastic, got the boat right up beside me. The guys just lay on the deck and grabbed me and hauled me on board."

Initial reports had said the water was freezing but David insisted: "It wasn't too bad. Because I had been in the water a while, attached to the boat, I got wet slowly - it wasn't as if I had jumped in and got a shock when I hit the water."

On-board, he was examined for signs of hypothermia and shock by Dr Erica Revie.

"I was sent to my bed for 12 hours, if not longer, and Erica monitored my blood pressure and temperature and then gave me the all-clear.

"Slowly but surely I went back on deck and within two days I was back on the foredeck and was back enjoying it.

"I was just so grateful and here I am today to prove what a great team and what a great skipper I had to bring me back here."

David left the Clipper crew when it landed in Australia, and after three days at home he was back at work.

Undaunted by his experience off South Africa, he returned as arranged for the seventh and final leg, from Jamaica to Liverpool.

"It's like falling off a bike or off a horse," he said. "You have to get back on and do it.

"I would do it again, definitely," he said of the Clipper race. "It's the experience of a lifetime."

Learning how to live alongside up to 18 other people was a big part of it.

"You get to know yourself and you also get to know other people's in and outs."

David laughed as he recalled how his relationship with Durban 2010 And Beyond crew member Mandy Brown, a university lecturer, started.

"She gatecrashed a party in Fremantle just before Christmas. I had been thrown into a pool and I was a bit traumatised after the experience I'd had just three weeks prior. So I gave her the sob-story ... and it worked!"

He added: "I've got six weeks left of my leave and I'll be heading to the York area where she lives and she'll be coming up here to see what Glasgow has to offer."