Crewman rescued after boat capsizes

The Coast Guard locates the men after the survivor activates the capsized fishing vessel's emergency beacon.

By BRIDGET HALL GRUMET and AMY WIMMER

© St. Petersburg Times, published October 2, 2000

CRYSTAL RIVER -- A search team rescued one fisherman and found another dead about 30 hours after the men's 37-foot commercial fishing boat capsized in the Gulf of Mexico.

The survivor, identified by the Florida Marine Patrol as Gregory Wayne Smith, 36, of Inglis, waited on an inflatable lifeboat until the seas calmed Sunday, then dove under the capsized boat to activate its emergency beacon.

The Coast Guard picked up the signal within an hour, and a helicopter rescued the man at about 10 a.m. Sunday.

However, his fishing companion, whose name was withheld pending notification of the family, was pinned under the boat until rescuers pulled his body from the water.

"(Smith) said they took a wave over the stern -- it happened that fast," said Lt. Cmdr. Mark Ryan, the Coast Guard pilot who handled the rescue. "The conditions out there are pretty nasty, with 6-foot swells and an occasional 8-footer."

Smith told the Coast Guard the boat capsized at about 4 a.m. Saturday, between 40 and 50 miles west of Crystal River. Smith felt his way out of the dark cabin of the boat and into the Gulf waters. He eventually grabbed hold of a lifeboat, Coast Guard spokesman Lt. Brian Hopkins said.

Smith was not expected back from his fishing trip until Monday afternoon, so he knew it would be days before anyone would report him missing, Hopkins said.

The boat, identified by Florida Marine Patrol as Sea Wolf, had an emergency beacon that could send a distress signal by satellite to the Coast Guard. But Smith did not know whether the beacon was activated when the boat overturned, Hopkins said.

The waters were choppy Saturday, so Smith waited out the day in the lifeboat, which had food and drinking water stashed in its waterproof pockets.

"He knew where (the emergency beacon) was, but he wasn't willing to put his life at risk to get it," Hopkins said.

When the seas turned calmer and the sun came up Sunday morning, Smith told authorities, he dove about six feet down into the water to activate the beacon. The Coast Guard picked up on the signal within an hour, and a rescue helicopter arrived on the scene shortly before 10 a.m.

"The guy that we rescued, he really had his act together," pilot Ryan said. "He was sharp on all of his survival skills. He knew to tie his raft to the vessel, he knew to use the emergency flares to bring us in. He had water and he had food."

A Coast Guard diver swam around the Sea Wolf and saw the legs of the other man who was trapped under the boat. But that diver was not equipped to rescue the man, so the helicopter brought Smith back to the Coast Guard air station in Clearwater and took two Citrus County Sheriff's Office rescue divers out to the scene, Hopkins said.

For a while, officials held out hope that the man could still be alive if he was in an air pocket.

Those hopes were ended when Deputy Gary Atchison and Sgt. Eddie Lane pulled the man's lifeless body from the rough waters. The helicopter brought the man to the Crystal River Airport, where a waiting ambulance crew declared him dead, Hopkins said.

A statement issued by Florida Marine Patrol says the agency is investigating the accident.

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