Viking 92 Freed from Florida Beach

This isn’t supposed to happen.

But last Friday afternoon, a Viking 92 sportfishing yacht named Pastime ended up on the beach in Delray Beach, Florida. The 151-ton boat, launched in 2016, was stuck in the sand, and couldn’t get off.

Despite heroic rescue efforts, it remained there for two days, until TowBoatUS was able to pump out more than 1,000 gallons of fuel and water and, working on a high tide, float it off. Remarkably, early reports say the Viking suffered just bent props and rudders. (I’ve been to the Viking factory in New Gretna, New Jersey, many times over the years; Vikings are built like little battleships.)

The problems started when a three-person crew was taking the boat from Palm Beach down to Fort Lauderdale. The details are scanty, but somehow the boat lost power off Delray Beach in 30-knot winds and 10-foot seas. The twin 2,600-hp MTU V12 diesels stopped, and the generator malfunctioned. Reports say the fire suppression system shut down the power for some reason.

In any event, the waves pushed the boat toward the beach, and there also apparently was a problem with the anchor. The captain decided to beach the boat to keep it from drifting.

He had first called the Coast Guard and both TowBoatUS and Sea Tow vessels responded. As you can see in the video below, their efforts to secure a line to the Pastime failed several times when the lines snapped.

Pastime was finally refloated on Sunday afternoon and it reportedly was taken to the Viking Service Center up in Riviera Beach on Lake Worth.

The boat, previously named Sweet Tuna, was sold last year. The asking price was $8,750,000.

Viking Yachts issued a statement saying that the yacht “encountered a fuel interruption to the generators and then main engines, at which point the 92 C lost power. It was set adrift as the captain and crew tried to resolve the problem. The crew tried to deploy the anchor by releasing the brake, but unfortunately, the devil claw was still attached. It subsequently was lodged in the deployment chute, rendering the anchor unusable. The 92 C came to rest on the shore in Delray Beach, Florida.” It also said that technicians at the Viking service center “determined that the incident was not the result of manufacturing or design error and that the damage was minimal.”