Former FLL Now MSP Diver
Contributor
Posted on Tue, Sep. 23, 2003
For young divers, one terrifying night
After their boat overturns, 8 friends swim for hours toward safety before being rescued.
BY CURTIS MORGAN
cmorgan@herald.com
Eight rescued after all-night ordeal at sea
Coming up the anchor rope after scuba diving with friends off Miami Sunday, Raymond Gill looked toward the surface and knew something was amiss.
Instead of the bright white bottom of their boat, a weird dark thing loomed overhead. At first, Gill thought they'd somehow found the wrong boat in the murky 70-foot depths, but as they swam up, the truth became all too clear.
''Oh [blank], that's the boat and it's upside down,'' Gill said Monday, only a few hours after he and seven friends had survived a wet, cold and scary all-night ordeal.
After their boat capsized near Fowey Rocks, they lashed together a makeshift raft from coolers and life vests and struggled to the safety of Stiltsville in north Biscayne Bay -- but only after tides and currents swept them from their first target of the Cape Florida lighthouse six miles away.
They spent some eight hours swimming in the dark, rough water, but it seemed endless.
''I can't even describe it. It was like hours and hours on end,'' said an exhausted Gill, 22.
A boater spotted them waving and yelling Monday morning on a Stiltsville porch. The rescue of the eight friends, ages 17 to 23 and mostly from West Kendall, brought a happy end to a night-long search by the U.S. Coast Guard and relief for worried family and friends.
''Oh my God, it was a nightmare,'' said Dottie Gill, Raymond's relieved mother. ``I haven't slept yet either. We prayed all night and talked to the other parents.''
According to Coast Guard spokesman Ryan Doss, the eight headed out early Sunday from Matheson Hammock for a dive trip. Aboard: Gill and friends, most from the Sunset High School area: Giovani Zamora, 22, whose father owned the boat; Yesenia Diaz, 22; Esteban Sosa and girlfriend Dianna Lotow, ages unknown; and Deidre Walsh, Brooke Benezra and Jessica Perez, all 17.
It wasn't a great day for boating, with winds to 20 knots, seas running an estimated five to seven feet and the National Weather Service posting small-craft advisories. But the 1989 23-foot Seacraft was a capable boat, and Gill said he and several in the crew were highly experienced, boating and diving in the areas since childhood. They anchored off Fowey, with six descending for a 40-minute dive.
When they came back up around 3:30 p.m., the boat had flipped. The two women left topside were drifting off, screaming and clinging to a cooler.
They all gathered next to the bobbing hull to assess the situation, Gill said. Their cellphones were gone. Their marine radio didn't work in the first place, according to the Coast Guard. Gill said Zamora dove under several times trying to locate the boat's signal flares but couldn't find them.
CUT OFF
With no way to call for help, Gill said they quickly gathered everything that would float -- coolers, life jackets, even inflating the buoyancy vests attached to the scuba tanks. Then, with the tide moving in, they cut the anchor, hoping to drift to shore with the floating hull or get close enough to flag down another boat.
But with darkness came cold. Then the boat seemed to stop moving, seemingly hooking something below.
Scared about surviving the night clinging to the slippery hull, Gill said they decided to swim for it -- aiming for the lighthouse silhouetted by the lights of downtown Miami at least six miles away.
TAKING TURNS
The strongest swimmers took turns pulling the others, Gill said. At one point, Gill spotted a channel marker to gauge progress. An hour later, they had barely made headway. The mood shifted with the current.
After some squabbling, they set out for Stiltsville -- closer but nearly invisible in the darkness.
They made it at around 5 a.m., broke a window, drank some bottled water stored inside and slept until dawn. They flagged a nearby boat around 9:30 a.m. and were reunited with joyful relatives by noon at the Coast Guard's Miami Beach station. Sunburn, jellyfish stings, dehydration and shaken nerves were the only injuries.
It remained uncertain why the boat, which was salvaged, had sunk.
The Coast Guard said the eight had been fortunate. For one, Doss said, they failed to file any float plan.
Parents didn't alert the Coast Guard until 11:24 p.m. and when they did, no one knew exactly where the boat had gone or even where they'd launched it.
They also left the boat, which is typically the easiest thing for rescuers to see.
Ismael Zamora, Giovani's father, said his son was right to swim for it.
''He definitely made the right decision,'' Ismael Zamora said. ``I think that was one of the reasons they're alive.''
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/6836155.htm
For young divers, one terrifying night
After their boat overturns, 8 friends swim for hours toward safety before being rescued.
BY CURTIS MORGAN
cmorgan@herald.com
Eight rescued after all-night ordeal at sea
Coming up the anchor rope after scuba diving with friends off Miami Sunday, Raymond Gill looked toward the surface and knew something was amiss.
Instead of the bright white bottom of their boat, a weird dark thing loomed overhead. At first, Gill thought they'd somehow found the wrong boat in the murky 70-foot depths, but as they swam up, the truth became all too clear.
''Oh [blank], that's the boat and it's upside down,'' Gill said Monday, only a few hours after he and seven friends had survived a wet, cold and scary all-night ordeal.
After their boat capsized near Fowey Rocks, they lashed together a makeshift raft from coolers and life vests and struggled to the safety of Stiltsville in north Biscayne Bay -- but only after tides and currents swept them from their first target of the Cape Florida lighthouse six miles away.
They spent some eight hours swimming in the dark, rough water, but it seemed endless.
''I can't even describe it. It was like hours and hours on end,'' said an exhausted Gill, 22.
A boater spotted them waving and yelling Monday morning on a Stiltsville porch. The rescue of the eight friends, ages 17 to 23 and mostly from West Kendall, brought a happy end to a night-long search by the U.S. Coast Guard and relief for worried family and friends.
''Oh my God, it was a nightmare,'' said Dottie Gill, Raymond's relieved mother. ``I haven't slept yet either. We prayed all night and talked to the other parents.''
According to Coast Guard spokesman Ryan Doss, the eight headed out early Sunday from Matheson Hammock for a dive trip. Aboard: Gill and friends, most from the Sunset High School area: Giovani Zamora, 22, whose father owned the boat; Yesenia Diaz, 22; Esteban Sosa and girlfriend Dianna Lotow, ages unknown; and Deidre Walsh, Brooke Benezra and Jessica Perez, all 17.
It wasn't a great day for boating, with winds to 20 knots, seas running an estimated five to seven feet and the National Weather Service posting small-craft advisories. But the 1989 23-foot Seacraft was a capable boat, and Gill said he and several in the crew were highly experienced, boating and diving in the areas since childhood. They anchored off Fowey, with six descending for a 40-minute dive.
When they came back up around 3:30 p.m., the boat had flipped. The two women left topside were drifting off, screaming and clinging to a cooler.
They all gathered next to the bobbing hull to assess the situation, Gill said. Their cellphones were gone. Their marine radio didn't work in the first place, according to the Coast Guard. Gill said Zamora dove under several times trying to locate the boat's signal flares but couldn't find them.
CUT OFF
With no way to call for help, Gill said they quickly gathered everything that would float -- coolers, life jackets, even inflating the buoyancy vests attached to the scuba tanks. Then, with the tide moving in, they cut the anchor, hoping to drift to shore with the floating hull or get close enough to flag down another boat.
But with darkness came cold. Then the boat seemed to stop moving, seemingly hooking something below.
Scared about surviving the night clinging to the slippery hull, Gill said they decided to swim for it -- aiming for the lighthouse silhouetted by the lights of downtown Miami at least six miles away.
TAKING TURNS
The strongest swimmers took turns pulling the others, Gill said. At one point, Gill spotted a channel marker to gauge progress. An hour later, they had barely made headway. The mood shifted with the current.
After some squabbling, they set out for Stiltsville -- closer but nearly invisible in the darkness.
They made it at around 5 a.m., broke a window, drank some bottled water stored inside and slept until dawn. They flagged a nearby boat around 9:30 a.m. and were reunited with joyful relatives by noon at the Coast Guard's Miami Beach station. Sunburn, jellyfish stings, dehydration and shaken nerves were the only injuries.
It remained uncertain why the boat, which was salvaged, had sunk.
The Coast Guard said the eight had been fortunate. For one, Doss said, they failed to file any float plan.
Parents didn't alert the Coast Guard until 11:24 p.m. and when they did, no one knew exactly where the boat had gone or even where they'd launched it.
They also left the boat, which is typically the easiest thing for rescuers to see.
Ismael Zamora, Giovani's father, said his son was right to swim for it.
''He definitely made the right decision,'' Ismael Zamora said. ``I think that was one of the reasons they're alive.''
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/6836155.htm
