my name is Peter Jacobsen I live in
Marathon Florida I have a single-engine
land pilot certificate and approximately
1,000 hours
the flight plan was to fly from Marathon
Florida to Tampa Vandenberg Airport the
evening of Friday Friday the 9th of
October to pick up my my step daughter
Whitney and her husband then we were
flying south a direct route to marathon
at about 4,000 feet over the coast of
Florida after Naples everything became
quite dark as there are no towns over
the Everglades and I was constantly in
contact with Miami Center for flight
following and after approximately 30
miles before approaching marathon the
engine stopped just suddenly with no
discernable noise
I tried to restart check the fuel and
then I called in the Mayday told Miami
center that that we lost power and about
2500 feet we lost contact with with
Miami and I turned around and told
Whitney he was sitting in the back to
grab the life vest we had to and she put
hers on been held one in the front seat
and I told them that we may hit the
water rather hard to try and hold their
heads while they're in a tough position
I told Ben to put his hand on the door I
could have her used landing gears and
flaps but I decided to keep it as simple
and and clean as possible as soon as I
saw the green I pulled back on the yoke
but there was not much time to flare so
I kept it straight and level we hit
rather hard and Ben and I both hit the
yokes
I did not lose consciousness but I have
I don't remember what happened after
that until I got in the water but
apparently been opened the door got out
on the wing pulled Whitney out they saw
me crawl out of the airplane and we all
three of us got next to the airplane the
first thing I remember was the tail
going straight down into the water
it was very dark black we could see
lights of Key West Marathon and and Isla
Mirada those are the three bigger towns
and the keys in front of us well we
didn't mention anything about what might
be lurking in the sea just kept focused
on trying to stay towards the lights and
swim that way until we hit some crab
traps it was tied off on one set and it
was too rough seas were probably 3 feet
before we let go and then float some
more and came to a second set of buoys
and we tied off the life vests one on
top of another and then hung on to those
we received a phone call from our base
in Key West of a single-engine plane
that it went down approximately 20 miles
by our Coast Guard Station at marathon
with three persons in the water we had
within five minutes launched our first
vessel approximately fifteen minutes
later we called in a second crew we used
our night-vision goggles long with what
we call mark 127 alpha parachute flares
initially I was quite optimistic about
trying to locate the plane because of
the quick time that we had gotten to the
to the search area after about a half an
hour each moment that passes you know
you start to wonder if this is getting
more and more difficult almost
immediately we could see the rescue
planes and boats and they were all
around and all night long we could see
them coming and going but they did not
see us I had just bought brand new vests
and to my horror they had no whistles no
lights nothing both of our boats
actually searched for approximately ten
hours
you know once we hit our fatigue limits
we had a convective station a couple of
got as much a few hours of sleep and
went back out first light to search
again see if we could find them and we
spotted the three people in the water
and we started yelling and screaming and
they saw us and and picked us up and
brought us back and we were about
20-some miles from marathon and they
brought us to the hospital and people
were there to greet us and had a pretty
good ending
the 3m clung on to the strap which is
actually tethered to the seafloor to a
way to store trap that uses several
pounds of concrete weight in the bottom
so that actually kept them in the
general vicinity of where the radar
contact was lost every time we bumped
each other we'd apologize because we're
thinking darn fish were under there but
they were jelly fishing around and
apparently they keep sharks away with
the water was about 80 degrees so not
until morning did we get to start
shivering most frustrating for us is
that they're close enough that they
could see us but we weren't in their
general vicinity when I was arc where we
couldn't see them so if they would add
something that would have been able to
signal us whether it was like a strobe
light or a flare or something of that
sort or even like a flashlight we
probably would have found him a lot
sooner my jackets thing would have
helped not only them float but I would
have kept him out of the water enough
possibly that they wouldn't lost so much
body heat and that we would been able to
spawn easier on our infrared cameras
exposure and cold is a serious problem
life raft would would be indispensable
that should be an every plane that goes
over water I can't stress enough is to
be prepared for these things and have
adequate safety gear on board including
that life vest for every person and
whistles and lights and and and
everything he can have to let people see
you