Photo: © 2010 AP via AAP/Richard Hartog

The 16-year-old American is the latest teenager attempting a solo circumnavigation of the globe.

But there were grave fears for her safety after two emergency beacons went off overnight in the stormy southern Indian Ocean, where she has been battling six-metre swells and 90 km/h winds.

One of those beacons has to be activated by hand and the other only goes off when the survival suit or life raft it is attached to hits water.

That left her Australian father, Laurence, in no doubt that the distress calls were genuine.

Earlier this morning, her told Radio 3AW his daughter's fate is "in God's hands" and that "it's going to take something out of the ordinary for her pull through this one."

Thankfully, the search crew on board a Qantas Airbus has made contact with the young adventurer, who is some 2000 nautical miles of the West Australian coast.

Her vessel is still upright but the mast is broken, her father says.

A rescue ship is expected to reach her around noon Saturday.