A volunteer crew from Northern Virginia rescued eight people after their 50-foot Carver sank in the Chesapeake last weekend.
The eight people had huddled together in the 49-degree water while the all-volunteer Smith Point Sea Rescue crew and the U.S. Coast Guard searched for them. After the rescue, the Coast Guard said the three women and five men were “in states of mild to moderate hypothermia” but they all were released in stable condition after treatment by local EMS crews.
The rescue started when someone on board the Nauti Dream, a 50-foot Carver, placed a 911 call on their cell phone, saying the boat was taking on water and starting to sink. Local authorities called the Coast Guard, which tried to reach the Nauti Dream on VHF channel 16, with no success. Authorities also alerted the Smith Point Sea Rescue crew, which launched their 42-foot rescue boat. The Coast Guard then launched a 29-foot fast response boat.
The phone company was able to identify the location of the cell phone call, near Buoy 62 in the Chesapeake off Virginia’s Northern Neck. The Coast Guard boat was able to make contact with the people in the water via VHF; the people in the water also lighted flares.
Then one of the Nauti Dream crew made a VHF call saying he could hear a boat nearby. The Smith Point crew found them soon after that, huddled together and floating in their life jackets about 1.5 miles northeast of Buoy 62.
The crew said one of them had just bought the boat and they were moving it from Virginia Beach to their homes in Jackson, New Jersey. Apparently they hit something in the water near Buoy 62.
The Coast Guard said the Nauti Dream crew had all the right equipment for survival in the water – life jackets, flares and a handheld VHF. And the fact that they all stayed together contributed to the safe rescue. Read more:
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