Friday, January 9, 2015

Calm seas and great fishing is back

Double digit day on sailfish and a dolphin for dinner yesterday with calm seas offshore.

However, up in the bay there was still some chop from yesterday's blow.   There was an overloaded 90+ foot catamaran with over 100 people on board making the trek up to Tortuga Island  for a day at the beach.   The unusual chop apparently blew out some windows in the engine room and the boat started taking on water and sunk within minutes.  We never knew what happened until getting back to the dock, but other boats from Los Suenos participated in rescue efforts.   Unfortunately there were 3 fatalities.

Attached is a press release from Los Suenos:
Today our community was affected by the tragic sinking of a passenger catamaran off the Central Pacific coast. Despite the fact that the vessel was not docked in Los Sueños, nor had any relationship with the Marina, many private vessels from the marina sped out to the accident site immediately to assist in the rescue of survivors. Sadly, of the 108 total passengers and crew on board, 3 died. The remaining passengers and crew have been accounted for. Forty of the passengers were picked up by a large ship and taken to Caldera. The others were brought back to the Los Sueños Marina by private vessels. We would like to give our deepest and heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and wish the survivors peace in the aftermath. At the same time, we would like to shed a spotlight on our marina, security, restaurants, operational and administrative staff, as well as those individuals in and around the Marina who rallied to have emergency services ready and provide whatever support was necessary to government officials, the media, and most importantly, anyone directly affected by the tragedy.