40' fishing boat found

psneeld said:

Without an actual timeline...it's hart to tell what coulda, woulda, should have been done.

Sure the checklist of things to do is great...but if number one is notice sinking boat, two is start assistance checklist but the boat sinks between number one and number two....kinda hard to fault anyone..especially when a second set of eyewitnesses saw it and proclaimed there was nothing they could do.

Hey...I hate the "suit crazed" world and still offer tows with my big old tubby trawler... I think assistance towing is stupid...but with the vast majority of boaters unable to tie a bowline...it probably is a good idea and saves fingers, eyes, lots of damage and maybe lives to boot from chuckleheads towing chuckleheads.

Just after being head of a safety organization that was responsible for conducting investigations..,and seeing all the jumped to conclusions and the pressure to get reports out...whether accurate or not...my tendency is to sit back and wait and see what the evidence shows...not news reports.

Yes Rick and everyone else, taking a moment to check things out should have risen to the top of that captain's priority list....I just wish I knew how much time he had to make that call.

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I agree. Many great statements in this post.

Happy cruising to you.

H. Foster

psneeld said:

I just wish I knew how much time he had to make that call.

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In my view, he had time enough to interpret the condition of the vessel as having a problem, and time enough to decide to keep on fishing. In my opinion, a prudent mariner would have decided to take a look.

If the boat sank as soon as he recognized something was amiss then it is one thing but deciding that something was amiss then deciding to keep on fishing until it sank is quite another.

Whether we credit him with quick thinking or slow, the timeline has been established. He had time to decide what he would do and he decided that fishing was more important to him. That is undeniable.

RickB said:

In my view, he had time enough to interpret the condition of the vessel as having a problem, and time enough to decide to keep on fishing. In my opinion, a prudent mariner would have decided to take a look.

If the boat sank as soon as he recognized something was amiss then it is one thing but deciding that something was amiss then deciding to keep on fishing until it sank is quite another.

Whether we credit him with quick thinking or slow, the timeline has been established. He had time to decide what he would do and he decided that fishing was more important to him. That is undeniable.

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As I have said many times on T.F. It's always great to get other's point of views on things.

In my view, I would say the Capt. would be credited with slow thinking and to be fair to him. I will say he did have the people aboard his vessel to worry about and the safety of his own vessel. The slow thinking in my view was due to the fact of not picking up the Mic. Other than that, I really do not believe he could not have done much more without endangering himself, his crew and his vessel. But yet, the one question I would like to know is how long did he watch the vessel before it went down? That is the key to me.

Happy cruising.

H. Foster

hfoster said:

... I really do not believe he could not have done much more without endangering himself, his crew and his vessel.

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Having no onscene knowledge or information about conditions I can only ask why you believe that? How would he endanger his vessel or pax by moving a short distance from his location?

He never said he couldn't operate his vessel safely or get closer, he never said the seas or weather were too dangerous to steer a course toward the apparently distressed vessel. Apparently he didn't think it was too dangerous to go to the location where it sank after it sank to look for survivors that according to his own statement he had no reason to believe might be there because he saw no one onboard while he watched it sink.

I personally don't think his actions or inactions are defensible.

RickB said:

Having no onscene knowledge or information about conditions I can only ask why you believe that? How would he endanger his vessel or pax by moving a short distance from his location?

He never said he couldn't operate his vessel safely or get closer, he never said the seas or weather were too dangerous to steer a course toward the apparently distressed vessel. Apparently he didn't think it was too dangerous to go to the location where it sank after it sank to look for survivors that according to his own statement he had no reason to believe might be there because he saw no one onboard while he watched it sink.

I personally don't think his actions or inactions are defensible.

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My reason are these Rick, and this is only my view.

If the Capt. could not made contact with the vessel, he would have two choices. 1: Call the USCG and sit and wait or 2: Try going aboard the vessel to see if there were any crew on board. The second one places him or his crew endanger as well as his vessel.

Moving closer would have been nice, but does not help anything. Call's do.


They all said the vessel went down fast. I myself would not want to take a chance on boarding a vessel that is settling in the water. That is a 50/50 call. You do not know when the vessel will slip under or roll or whatever, with you or one of your crew on the vessel.

That is why I would like to know how long he watch that vessel before it went down. Even so as I said. it's 50/50 boarding a vessel like that. I would have to know someone is onboard to take that chance or have good reason to believe someone was onboard.

I hope that answers your question.

Happy cruising to you.

H. Foster

shufti said:

All throughout - I was astounded we were the only vessel that not only went to assist- but no-one else even bothered turning on or responding to radio after THREE red flares went off. There were about 8-10 boats within 1-3 miles from us. No way we were the only ones that saw the flares. Needless to say - it has shaken my longstanding belief that fellow boaters give a crap about 'the other guy' - at least when they're on the water.

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Great response on your part. I hope that you are around if I am ever in trouble.

If I had been anchored in the area at that time in the evening, I may not have seen the flares. I would have been below in my plastic bottle with no real visibility outside. I also may have had the VHF turned off. I can easily see me missing the entire thing. Makes me wonder think that when in a more remote anchorage, I might keep the VHF on, particularly during a slow season like April.

psneeld said:

Hey...I hate the "suit crazed" world and still offer tows with my big old tubby trawler... I think assistance towing is stupid...but with the vast majority of boaters unable to tie a bowline...it probably is a good idea and saves fingers, eyes, lots of damage and maybe lives to boot from chuckleheads towing chuckleheads.

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I resemble that remark.

When I towed the drifting sailboat, the captain (ok the 20 something kid) tossed me his one genoa sheet as a tow line. It wasn't as long as I would like, nor was it in very good condition, but after watching him tie it to his anchor roller, I didn't want to try to send him another line. The handiest line I had was a 40 foot dock line anyway and it would have taken a while to dig out the spare anchor rode to pass him. Anyway, chucklehead that I was, I didn't pay enough attention when cleating the short tow line and it ended up slipping off my cleat.

Yeah, it was embarrassing.

Going to have to toss my 2 cents in the ring on this. I have been keeping an eye on this for several reasons, one of them being that it is not far outside my home inlet. Anyone who has the slightest hint that a boat/ship/watercraft is having difficulty (especially taking on water) has a moral obligation to act in some way shape or form. Not attempting to render aide boarders on a criminal act in my eyes. The Captain of the El Jeffe could have been laying on the floor after having a heart attack, still alive, praying that someone would come to his aide only to drown to death as someone sat on his ass fishing. This may be speculation on my point but we will never know because someone did not have the human decency to act. Sorry if this seems a bit harsh but to me someone that does not "get involved" in a situation like this is either a coward or a sorry excuse for a human being. There was no danger to a vessel going in to take a closer look, infact the condition in this area have been extremely calm for the past week. If you were in the El Jeffe's situation what do you think another boat's captain should have done, what does your wife think he should have done, what do your kids think he should have done. I will get off my soapbox now.

kwmeyer13 said:

Going to have to toss my 2 cents in the ring on this.

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Hear hear!

And worth a lot more than 2 cents. Thank you for posting that.

kwmeyer13 said:

Going to have to toss my 2 cents in the ring on this. I have been keeping an eye on this for several reasons, one of them being that it is not far outside my home inlet. Anyone who has the slightest hint that a boat/ship/watercraft is having difficulty (especially taking on water) has a moral obligation to act in some way shape or form. Not attempting to render aide boarders on a criminal act in my eyes.

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I agree with you but.....

hfoster said:

They all said the vessel went down fast. I myself would not want to take a chance on boarding a vessel that is settling in the water. That is a 50/50 call. You do not know when the vessel will slip under or roll or whatever, with you or one of your crew on the vessel.

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H. Foster makes an excellent point. We all have to weigh risks to ourselves while making these decisions. Where we each come down on that will depend on a number of things. My wife tends to be much more risk averse than I am in situations. I probably don't tend to give risks to myself enough thought. For example, I would probably have attempted to board that vessel to check for occupants. If I found it empty, or felt it was empty, I would get off as fast as I could.

But then my grandfather jumped into the surf at age 80 to save a drowning women and my father entered a burning house at aged 70 to get a family out. In the case of the house, he didn't know it was occupied but he felt that there was a high enough likelyhood that he couldn't stand by.

We each have our own decisions to make and I won't criticize those that make rational decisions to not put themselves at risk. We also all have different skills, experience, and knowledge that comes into play. Now, those that don't render aid because they don't want to be inconvenienced is another matter.

As of yet no one has mentioned the type of anchor or how much chain the "party boat" captain had deployed. If it was a ROCNA he would not likely have been able to break it free in time to investigate/rescue.


I just had to....sorry!

Allow me to be clear here and I do hope I did not mislead anyone in my statement about boarding a settling vessel. I was only answer Rick's question on how I thought the Capt. would be placing he and his crew endanger.


When it comes to boarding a vessel like that, one must look at many different factors, like how much freeboard is left on the vessel. What is the sea and wind doing. How long will it take the USCG to get there. Does the vessel look like it has been at sea a long time or not. God the list will go on.


No one knows what they will do until they are faced with it. As I said, if I believed a person was onboard, believe me I would do everything in my power help them but still it's a 50/50 call. In most cases I would roll the dice. I would like to believe I would and I think most people would! Well I do hope they would!


Anyways. I did not want anyone taking what I replied to Rick in the wrong way.


Happy cruising.


H. Foster

Greetings,
Mr. 86. the first thing I thought of was "captain got drunk and passed out in the cabin" or some other area not visible from afar. A few gulps of salt water as the vessel was sinking and he's a goner....Hope not. I have no idea what I would have done under similar circumstances. I would like to think I would have investigated or at least put out a securite call.

Where or who made any mention of boarding the other vessel? Why has the wisdom or safety of boarding the vessel even under discussion when the fishing boat captain made a choice to not even approach close enough to ask questions or take a better look.

The entire point of the discussion as I see it is the fishing captain stood off and watched a boat sink without making the slightest effort to even get within speaking distance until after it sank. The only mention of safety originated on this forum.

The speed at which it actually sank beneath the water is completely irrelevant. Some boats flood for hours then "suddenly" sink. It evidently took some time to downflood, at least enough time to be noticed and for the witness to decide to go fishing after convincing himself no one was onboard the vessel.

RickB said:

Where or who made any mention of board the other vessel? Why has the wisdom or safety of boarding the vessel even under discussion when the fishing boat captain made a choice to not even approach close enough to ask questions or take a better look.

The entire point of the discussion as I see it is the fishing captain stood off and watched a boat sink without making the slightest effort to even get within speaking distance until after it sank.

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Well said!

However this story turns out, at this point it doesn't look too good for the fish boat captain. No idea if he'll be liable etc., just doesn't look good. Most of us here have been around long enough to recognize that if something looks weird, there a 50/50 chance that it is, so go over and check it out. You might get an ass chewing for butting in, or you might find someone in real trouble. I have no problem with an ass chewing, but I have a big problem if someone gets hurt or dies and maybe I could have helped but didn't.