I was in route from the coastal United States of America to the U.S.
Virgin Islands, intended destination was a small island named Culebra. I received
a favorable forecast on December 26; I waited for a front to pass.
I had a good five-day forecast and headed offshore. Late Tuesday
night the weather struck, Wednesday afternoon
on into Wednesday evening I saw the largest seas I had yet experienced.
At that point I had damaged steering, all my electronics were flooded with saltwater
the wheel pilot failed and I was unable to steer the boat. Conditions worsened
on Friday, I was pretty badly battered by this time myself there was
really nothing working on the boat except me. On Saturday the boat was
turned mostly upside down when it was thrown off of another sea. When I could see again
the EPIRB was on. I had always believed that I would use
my EPIRB as I was climbing out of my sinking boat into a life raft,
something told me not to
turn it off. Couple hours later the coast guard had dispatched a
C-130 Hercules. I have to say this, the
people who work for the U.S. Coast Guard are all heroes in my book. When
another large sea broke on;
it just happened so fast. The Gloria Adios was
violently rolled over three hundred and sixty degrees.
I was caught by my right knee
and dragged under the surface of the Atlantic. And when I reached the surface
I could see the boat about thirty feet away and I desperately tried to swim and catch that sailboat.
I saw her sail away and leave me there
and I was alone in the dark in the storm, two hundred
and fifty miles offshore. I kicked off my boots
and just started to swim. While I was floating there in the dark I saw the second
C-130 aircraft return to the area only they couldn't find me, I
wasn't on my boat anymore. It was dark
and I saw their lights, they were flying over there,
I knew that they would look for me but I knew that they wouldn't find me. And then
sometime as I struggled on continuing to pray
I bumped into a life raft in the dark, I couldn't believe it, I really
couldn't believe it. I was freezing but I knew I was going to live. I patted
down my pocket and in my pocket I found a cheap non-waterproof flashlight.
I turned it on and I shined it at that helicopter and that guy flew right over there to me. They flew right
to my position, that diver came right down in there, Kyle Need,
Navy, U.S. Navy. He came
down into that storm for me that is the bravest thing
I've ever seen anybody do in my life, The guys in that helicopter really new what they were
doing. They had to dive at the tops of those waves while they had their guy
and me down there in the water. They drug us through of those waves
that was okay we were going up.
The helicopter took me to the deck of the Eisenhower;
I'd been cold and wet for four days, didn't have any shoes
but I was sure glad to be there. The EPIRB I had
was an older model it was manually deployed and it did
not contain a GPS locator and so it did not
encrypt a GPS location into the signal. I'm very glad I had that
beacon and I actually spoke to the representative
and the manufacturer and I told him that I was a very satisfied
customer. The EPIRB was instrumental in saving my
life. Now the coast guard,
the navy, they were instrumental in saving my life also.