Navy aircrew plucks fishermen from life raft 161 miles from Hawaii
COURTESY U.S. NAVY
A MH-60R Sea Hawk helicopter Easyriders of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron (HSM) 37 takes off from the guided-missile destroyer USS Preble on Feb. 8, 2015.
COURTESY U.S. COAST GUARD
Jonathan Hoag, the captain of the fishing vessel Vicious Cycle, and his two crew members, Zaenal and Syamsul, are all smiles after being rescued by the Navy and Coast Guard, after their vessel sank 161 miles southwest of Kona early this morning.
A Navy MH-60 Sea Hawk helicopter rescued three fishermen, who had abandoned ship 161 miles southwest of Kona early this morning.
A 41-foot commercial fishing boat, the Vicious Cycle, began to sink after taking on water and the fishermen got into a lifeboat with an emergency positioning indicating radio beacon or EPIRB, the Coast Guard and Navy reported.
The fishermen used flares and a flashing light to signal a Coast Guard C-130 dispatched to search for them.
Seas were reported at 10 feet with winds blowing at 28 mph.
A crew from Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron 37, the Easyriders, based at Marine Corps Base Hawaii in Kaneohe, arrived on scene and took them on board the helicopter at 2:47 a.m. and brought them to Kalaeloa Airport, where paramedics treated them for mild hypothermia and took them to the Queen’s Medical Center West Oahu for evaluation at about 4:16 a.m.
“Huge thanks to the Coast Guard and the Navy for our rescue,” said Jonathan Hoag, the captain of the Viscious Cycle, in a Coast Guard news release. “Everything was incredibly well organized and we are here now to prove it.”
Also responding were the Coast Guard cutter Alex Haley, homeported in Kodiak, Alaska and which was diverted from their course back to Alaska; and the fishing vessel Princess K.
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