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The Coast Guard planned to continue the search overnight Tuesday for a 66-year-old Seattle man who was reported overdue on a sailboat trip from Kauai to Oahu.
Ira Foreman of Seattle left Port Allen on Dec. 17 and was scheduled to arrive on Oahu on Dec. 18 or 19, his wife, Susan Spinola, said from Seattle. The Coast earlier said Foreman was due Dec. 18 at Keehi Lagoon.
Spinola said her husband is a retired shipwright and an experienced sailor who has sailed to Hawaii and islands in the South Pacific, including New Zealand.
"He loves sailing. He loves being on the ocean," she said Tuesday.
Foreman was sailing from American Samoa and had missed Oahu and landed on Kauai, she said.
He was sailing to Oahu to clear U.S. Customs.
Spinola said her husband spoke to her by cellphone as he left Port Allen.
She said he had a VHS radio and an Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon that could be activated manually.
His sailing boat, the Arcturus, is a 36-foot ketch with a white hull, white sails, twin masts and four portholes on each side, his wife and the Coast Guard said.
Coast Guard officials in Honolulu were notified at 3:15 p.m. Saturday by his wife that Foreman was overdue.
Officials checked harbors on Kauai and Oahu Sunday.
The Coast Guard said it has conducted more than 10 searches by air since Sunday and that the search area has expanded to 200 miles north, 300 miles south and 400 miles west of Kauai, covering about 178,000 square miles.
An HC-130 Hercules airplane search crew from Air Station Barbers Point and a Navy P-3 Orion airplane crew from Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay launched at 10 a.m. Tuesday to continue the search.
The Coast Guard said to aid in the search, it is using an advanced computer program that weighs various weather factors, including wind and current speed and direction.
"We are using all available information to determine the sailboat’s location," said Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Michael Labine.
"We have partnered with the Navy using both Coast Guard C-130 and Navy P-3 aircraft to search the large area where the sailboat may have drifted in the past week and hopefully reunite Mr. Foreman with his family," he said.
Anyone with information regarding Foreman’s whereabouts is urged to contact the Coast Guard at 842-2600.
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