Coast Guard Rescues Charter Boat South Of Nantucket

Coast Guard Station Brant Point completed a seven-person water rescue mission Tuesday afternoon, master chief Lance Wiser confirmed to the Current.

Station Brant Point launched for a 42-foot fishing vessel “Overland” that was disabled and taking on water approximately 17 miles south of Siasconset.

The vessel had seven people on board and was taking on water from an unknown location in the engine room.

“We received the call about 1 p.m. this afternoon, launched within a few minutes, but still had over a two hour estimated arrival time due to the location of the fishing vessel,” Wiser said.

Coast Guard Cutter “HAMMERHEAD,” the 87-foot cutter, homeported out of Woods Hole, diverted from wind turbine operations, and arrived on scene to stabilize the vessel. Station Brant Point’s 47-foot motor life boat arrived shortly after, and took the vessel in tow.

Wiser said all seven individuals aboard the boat are safe and unharmed. At approximately 9:30 p.m. Tuesday evening, Wiser provided an update to the Current that after towing the disabled fishing vessel for over four hours around Great Point and into the Nantucket Sound, Station Brant Point transferred the tow to commercial towing, who will continue the tow to Hyannis.

“The weather conditions were ideal for this evolution today," Wiser said. "We train year-round in much worse sea conditions. No mission is ever easy or routine, but it was nice to have relatively calmer conditions to complete this mission.”

David Rontal, the owner of the 42-foot vessel homeported in Hyannis, said they had a leak in the fish hold that they repaired in the offseason. However, he believes it likely delaminated during a weather event and beating it took when they were setting up their nighttime troll Monday night when it was gusting 45 knots.

"We were able to pump out the bilge but not before water had hit our twin disc computer system (transmission) which it fried," Rontal said. "We would have otherwise been able to get home under our own power."

"This is also a huge endorsement for Starlink, which we have on the boat," Rontal added. "While we were able to reach USCG Brant Point on channel 16, Starlink allowed us to be in touch with not only Seatow, but our families as well letting them know we were ok."

Rontal said just after 10:30 p.m. Tuesday evening that he and the other six boaters were expected to be back in Hyannis at 11:30 p.m.

"Thankfully (this) wasn’t a huge life threatening issue but does underscore why we focus on safety redundancies on our boat," he said.