Mariners found on life raft after escaping burning boat off Outer Banks, officials say
Two mariners were 15 miles off Cape Lookout — on North Carolina’s Outer Banks — Thursday morning when their boat caught fire and started taking on water.
One of mariners aboard the 35-foot fishing boat, named Double G, made a mayday call to the Coast Guard Sector North Carolina, according to a news release from the Coast Guard.
The two then threw on life jackets, grabbed a satellite phone and abandoned ship on a life raft, the release says.
Watchstanders with the Coast Guard put out an urgent marine information broadcast in response to the mayday call and launched a boat crew to the scene in a 47-foot motor lifeboat, the release says.
A Navy oiler nearby, hearing the Coast Guard’s broadcast, also sent a helicopter crew to the scene to assist.
When the Coast Guard got to the scene, they found the two mariners on the life raft unharmed and took them back to the station at Fort Macon, where their families were waiting, the release says.
The ship later sank in 60 feet of water about seven miles from the Beaufort Inlet, according to the Coast Guard.
TowBoatUS monitored the boat the entire time, the release says.
“After the vessel sank, they reported no discharge of fuel or oil into the water,” Petty Officer 1st Class Tom Agzigian, a marine science technician with the Coast Guard, said in the release. “Due to the size of the fire, length of time it burned and thick black smoke, it is presumed that any diesel fuel and lubricating oil that was on board was burnt up in the fire with no recoverable products left.”
It’s unclear what caused the blaze.
Cmdr. Tracy Wirth, deputy sector commander for Coast Guard Sector North Carolina, said in the release the incident was a “textbook abandon ship evolution.”
“The mariners did everything right to save their own lives by using the correct lifesaving equipment available to them, to include their VHF radio, life jackets, life raft, EPIRB and strobe lights,” Wirth said. “The simple use of this equipment can mean the difference between life and death, and this positive outcome is based on the mariner’s own emergency preparedness by simply having the equipment and more importantly knowing how to use it.”
This story was originally published July 16, 2020 at 5:59 PM with the headline "Mariners found on life raft after escaping burning boat off Outer Banks, officials say."
