Nothing like leaving on a fishing trip aboard a 75-foot sport boat and returning on one of the Navy's 509-foot guided missile destroyers.
That was the fate of most of the passengers who survived a scary night at sea Tuesday when the sport boat Legend out of Seaforth Sportfishing began taking water at about 6 p.m., 90 miles southwest of San Diego.
By 8 p.m., all 32 passengers were safely off the boat – five airlifted by Navy or U.S. Coast Guard helicopters, 28 others (including one crewman) taken by Zodiac boats to the Preble, a guided missile destroyer. There were no injuries reported.
Meantime, Captain Shawn Trowbridge and four crewmen steered the Legend into a cove inside Colonet, some 100 miles south of San Diego. Captain Tom Ebner's Aztec – loaded with materials, plywood, workers and crewmen – left just before noon yesterday to assist in repairing the Legend for the trip north. The Legend could be back in Mission Bay with the anglers' catch, gear and clothing as soon as tomorrow if the necessary repairs are made and the weather cooperates.
“To be honest,” said Paul Betito of Sacramento, “I paid $275 for this trip, but if you would have told me that I was going to get to ride on a Zodiac boat in high seas and then get on a battleship, I would have paid $500 for the whole deal. It was impressive.”
Just before 6 p.m., Trowbridge's 75-foot Legend had a good catch in the hold – limits of yellowtail, a few albacore and a bluefin. He was making his way up the line, trolling toward Mission Bay, returning from a 1½ -day trip. Many of the passengers were sleeping. By 6:30, they were putting on life jackets.
The Coast Guard reported that at 7:11 p.m. it responded to a vessel in distress. The crew reported “a broken hull-support beam on the hull of the vessel and that it was taking on water with weather conditions of 15-to 18-foot seas and winds upward of 25 knots,” according to the Coast Guard report. The boat was taking on water at 30 to 50 gallons a minute.
“They were afraid they were going to sink, so they called a Mayday, Mayday,” said Mark Mutchler, a search and rescue controller for the Coast Guard.
The Coast Guard sent two MH-60 Jayhawk helicopters and a Coast Guard swimmer with water pumps. The swimmer helped three passengers evacuate the boat. The Navy assisted the remaining passengers, taking two more by helicopter.
Passengers said the only scary moments were during the airlifting. One angler hit his head on the helicopter door. Another was dunked briefly in the ocean. And one of the Navy rescuers was slammed into the bait tank.
The Coast Guard said it will continue its investigation when the Legend returns.
“The crew members who know what happened are down there (at Colonet),” Chief Warrant Officer Mike McCright said at Seaforth Sportfishing yesterday after securing contact information from passengers and crew who returned on the Preble.
McCright said it appears the Legend's leak started with a small crack.
“We understand it started with a crack that was three-quarter-inch wide and seven inches long in the crew quarters,” McCright said. “They were in 10-to 15-foot seas. One of the passengers playing cards said the spray from the seas was coming up over the top of the bridge.”
Since the offshore season for yellowtail, albacore and bluefin tuna started in late April, captains have reported seeing giant logs floating in the open ocean.
Several passengers said they felt more than one thump, but boats smacking into high swells often sound as if they're hitting something.
Jim Hughes, owner and captain of the Cortez, joined Captain Tom Ebner on his boat, the Aztec, along with John Collins, Jack Rader, Mike Franchak and the Legend's second captain, Aaron Barnhill, to help Trowbridge get the Legend seaworthy. He assured Trowbridge's wife, Raquel, who was at the landing yesterday, that the boat will return.
“We'll stop the flooding and do what we need to get it back here,” Hughes said. “Once it's here, it can be lifted and taken care of better. Shawn said there's a big gouge in the bottom of the boat. We'll fix it. We've fixed that boat before. Shawn and his crew did a great job. The passengers are all here. The boat didn't sink, and everyone is alive.”
Said passenger Carel Deiongh of Venice: “They (the captain and crew of the Legend) put us before themselves and did everything they could to make sure we were rescued.”
Staff writers Debbi Farr Baker and Angelica Martinez contributed to this report.
Ed Zieralski: (619) 293-1225; ed.zieralski@uniontrib.com
