Maritime Injury Lawyer Blog

According to reports, 44-foot F/V MANDY NESS capsized late Tuesday night, about ten miles off Barnegat Light, New Jersey. The shipboard EPIRB was activated when it hit water and alerted the Coast Guard, which deployed a helicopter, a 47-foot rescue boat, and broadcast the emergency to vessels in the area.

Nearby F/V FRANCES ANN responded to the broadcast and was able to bring one of the two crewmembers aboard alive. That person is doing well. However, the other crewmember was trapped under the capsized hull of MANDY NESS. A Coast Guard rescue swimmer pulled that person out, but that person remained unresponsive to CPR and was pronounced dead at the hospital.

Continue reading "Fishing Vessel Capsizes, One Survivor" »

Sunday, January 8, the Coast Guard Joint Rescue Coordination Center in Honolulu was alerted that the 18-year-old master of U.S.-flagged F/V SIVA MOANA had fallen overboard while bringing in fishing gear. The young man was not wearing a life jacket. SIVA MOANA was about 115 miles south of American Samoa at the time.

An air search ensued, first by the Royal New Zealand Air Force, joined and relieved by the Coast Guard out of Barbers Point, using SAROPS (Search and Rescue Optimal Planning System). SAROPS determines the most probable search area by computing information on weather, wind speed and direction, and search object size. The Coast Guard also measured currents using two self-locating data marker buoys. They covered a 2,890 mile search area before suspending the search later on Monday, after taking time, survival probability, and weather data into account.

January 9, the captain of F/V VINCENZO radioed the New Haven Coast Guard, gave their position as twelve miles south of Shinnecock, Long Island, and reported that the vessel was flooding. Soon after, he radioed again that the two-person crew were in their survival suits and were abandoning ship for their life raft, EPIRB in hand.

The Coast Guard sent out an urgent marine information broadcast. Nearby Good Samaritan F/V RHONDA & DENISE picked up the crew from the life raft, soon transferring the VINZENCO crew to a Coast Guard rescue boat. No one was reported injured.
The Coast Guard noted the captain's calm demeanor during the emergency.

Late the afternoon of January 7, the Boston Coast Guard received an EPIRB signal from Rhode Island based 55-foot F/V ELIZABETH HELEN. A Coast Guard motor life boat went in search and located the two-person crew in their life raft within an hour, thanks to the crew setting off a red flare. No injuries are reported, although 900 gallons of diesel were on board the capsized and sinking vessel.

The afternoon of January 1, a crewmember aboard 57-foot F/V CAPTAIN KIDD broke his arm when it was caught in an anchor line. CAPTAIN KIDD alerted the Coast Guard in Anchorage, which dispatched a Kodiak-based helicopter to safely lift and fly the injured crewman to Kodiak for emergency treatment, all in under an hour of the time of the initial call. After emergency treatment, the man was transferred to Providence Kodiak Island Medical Center, for further care.

F/V ARICA, a 200-foot fishing vessel moored in Lake Union in Seattle, began to take on water. ARNICA had been in drydock and was recently returned to the water. The crew had set up pumps to expel water from an apparent hull leak. The power source to the pumps failed; the water level is reported to have become about a foot deep inside the engine room by the time Seattle firefighters arrived with equipment to resume pumping.

Power was restored morning and there were no injuries and no fuel leaks or spills into Lake Union noted, but as a precaution, a boom has been placed around ARICA, and the pumped-out water is undergoing sewage treatment to remove any oil traces. The leak was thought to be caused by a problem with the sea chest, a grated recess in the hull of the ship used for intake and piping of raw water for secondary cooling of the main propulsion engine.

Afternoon of December 12, F/V RANDI capsized and sank about three miles off the Coos Bay jetty with three fishermen on board. Two fishermen, Seth Smith and Bruce Potts, survived and were picked up by F/V PATTY AJ. Jim Peterson, who was trapped inside the wheelhouse, is still missing.

According to reports, Smith noticed the boat listing, and as he moved toward the load of crab pots, a swell hit RANDI. The swell caused F/V RANDI to turn on her side and then quickly slide underwater. Smith was able to get free of the tangle of crab pots and lines and swam toward Potts, who he saw trying to inflate the life raft. Potts was wearing his life jacket, but he had become hypothermic. Smith grabbed him and swam for PATTY AJ, which had already sent out a mayday, and picked them up. Potts was airlifted by Coast Guard helicopter and taken to the hospital, and an unsuccessful Coast Guard search for Jim Peterson ensued.

Coast Guard answered a distress call on November 30 from the STEVE C, a fishing vessel holding around 22 tons of catch.The STEVE C had lost steering in bad weather about 21 miles northwest of Clatsop Spit, Oregon. Coast Guard reached the STEVE C by 52-foot motor lifeboat TRIUMPH early that afternoon and, through 14-18 foot swells, towed the disabled vessel across the Columbia River bar to Cape Disappointment shortly after midnight. There were no injuries.

A shrimper died in a fall from a boat in the Gulf of Mexico this week. According to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the fifty-eight-year-old man was working as a deckhand on the twenty-six -foot long commercial fishing vessel when he fell into the water.

The seas were rough at the time of the accident. The owner of the boat was unable to rescue the unresponsive deckhand. There were only two people on the boat at the time of the incident. The owner of the vessel managed to retrieve the victim's body from the water, and took the boat to shore, where paramedics intervened.

The 143-foot Alaska Fishing vessel, REBECCA IRENE, lost engine power in the face of an impending severe storm. Twenty crewmen were evacuated from the vessel, 14 essential personnel remained on board. The vessel was taken under the escort of the Coast Guard Cutter SHERMAN. Hurricane force winds were approaching the Alaska coastline at the time of the rescue. Seas as high as forty feet were anticipated.

A United States Coast Guard Helicopter airlifted a 28-year old deckhand from the 150-foot crab fishing vessel WIZARD 60 miles north of Cold Bay. The crewman reportedly collapsed and was showing signs of dehydration and shock. The cause of the crewman's illness was not described in initial reports.

The Coast Guard, Bainbridge Island, Wash., Fire Department, the state department of Ecology and American Gold Seafoods are responding to a fire and potential fuel spill on one of American Gold Seafood's floating fish-rearing pens in Rich Passage, off Beans Point in Kitsap County, Wash., Thursday.

Coast Guard Sector Puget Sound received a report of the fire from a Washington State Ferry crew at approximately 1:30 a.m. The Bainbridge Island Fire Dept. extinguished the fire, which occured in a small shed on the floating pen.  The fire involved an air compressor system. This system has been disconnected from its diesel fuel source, and the diesel fuel source has been secured.

Continue reading "Agencies Respond to Fire" »

The 36-foot fishing vessel ICE MAIDEN capsized Sunday, July 3 in the Prince William Sound off Rocky Point, Alaska. Reports say the vessel capsized while hauling in a net full of salmon. Good Samaritan fishing vessels NEW VENTURE and AQUANATOR provided assistance and transported the crew to nearby Cordova. ICE MAIDEN then sank and came to rest on the seafloor in 35 to 45 feet of water, said Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Jason Boyle.

Continue reading "Fishing Vessel Sunk" »

Coast Guard Sector Anchorage was notified that a crewman aboard the 32-foot fishing vessel MISS MARIA was suffering from a severely broken forearm, Friday, July 1.

The Coast Guard helicopter crew hoisted the 56-year-old fisherman and transferred him to awaiting emergency medical services in Kodiak. The fisherman suffered a double compound fracture to his right forearm. Published reports do not indicate the cause of his injury. He was taken to Providence Kodiak Island Medical Center in stable condition.

Coast Guard District Seventeen received notification Thursday, July 7, that Anthony Imas, 50, was injured and required medical assistance. Imas was reportedly suffering from severe back pain after falling aboard the 50-foot fishing vessel HEIDI LINEA.

The Coast Guard helicopter rescue crew hoisted Imas off the vessel. Reports indicate that Imas was in stable condition. Imas was taken to Providence Kodiak Island Medical Center for further care.