Four people are still missing after a boat that went on a day trip off the coast of California did not come back. One person has been found dead.
A press release on Monday from the US Coast Guard said that the search for the last four people would end off the coast of Bodega Bay “pending the development of new information” at 6:30 p.m. on Sunday.
It was around 8 a.m. on Sunday that an 11-year-old boy was found alive off of South Salmon Creek beach. The boat had capsized on Saturday.
The news source also said that he was taken to the hospital and was in stable condition.
Officials say that the body of a second teenager was found about two hours later.
The police did not say if the body was that of the 14-year-old or the 17-year-old.
At 11:40 p.m. on Saturday, the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office sent a message to the Coast Guard about “six overdue boaters aboard a 21-foot blue and white vessel.” The boaters had left Westside Marina around 3 p.m. that day and were supposed to return by 7 p.m.
Levi Read, chief petty officer with U.S. Coast Guard District 11, told The New York Times that there were three adults and three teens on board the boat. The teens were ages 11, 14, and 17.
Read also said that the group was from Corning, California, and that five of the people on board were thought to be related, but the police did not say so. Read said that one of the people on board was a family friend.
The group was crabbing off the coast of Bodega when a cell phone ping told them that the boats were close to Carmet Beach.
As of about 3 p.m., the last time anyone on board was heard from was by Sonoma deputies.
To find the people who fell overboard, the Sheriff’s Office Marine Unit, Henry One, the Sheriff’s Office Drone team, the Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue team, Sonoma County Fire, Coast Guard boats, helicopters, fixed-wing aircraft, and State Parks all worked together as a search force.
Soon after, the US Air Force sent planes to help with the search, according to officials.
The combined search took 57 hours and covered more than 2,100 square miles. After that, the Coast Guard decided to end the rescue mission.
U.S. Coast Guard CWO “The decision to suspend a search is always hard to make and is never done lightly,” said Michael L. Zapawa, who is in charge of search and rescue in San Francisco.
“During this very sad time, our thoughts and prayers are with the families of the missing boaters.”
Coast Guard officials told everyone on the water to have a float plan, a VHF radio that works, and to always check the weather before leaving.
