Originally Posted by Ray
Last Saturday morning Robert and Noemi Rodriguez decided to take their two mentally-challenged relatives out for a day of fishing, something that they all enjoyed doing together. Fishing for drum, reds and trout on Nueces Bay, near Corpus Christi, Texas is a popular sport for anglers in that area. The Rodriguez’s boat was an old 14’ aluminum vessel with an aging 20-hp carbureted outboard motor. But before putting their trailerable boat in the water, they stopped at the Nueces Bay Bait Stand on Causeway Blvd. for some bait. They bought live “mantis shrimp” (aka “sea lice,” or “thumb-splitters”) which is the bait of choice used by anglers in Nueces Bay. Before Robert Rodriguez left the bait shop he picked up one of the shop’s business cards and a USCG flyer. A little after 6 pm that evening the phone at the bait shop rang. Debbie, who works the afternoon shift cleaning the bait tanks in order to keep the “thumb-splitters” alive, answered the phone. It was Robert Rodriguez on his cell phone from his boat out in the bay and he needed some help.
Debbie told us what Rodriguez wanted:
“He told me that his outboard motor had stopped working and he couldn’t get it started,” she said. “He wanted to know if I knew anyone who could drag him in. I told him that I knew a man who sometimes brings boats in, Jim King, who lived nearby and maybe he would help.”
Jim King is a local bounty hunter and he used to work at the bait shop, but Debbie did not have his phone number. But she told Rodriguez that she would call people who knew King in hopes of getting his number.
In the meantime it was getting dark. And on Nueces Bay in April when it gets dark the wind often comes up. “The back bay gets rough at night,” says Debbie, “and it can be dangerous when the wind comes up.”
While Debbie was trying to locate bounty-hunter King, the wind did indeed began to pick up (up to 25-knots says the USCG) and we suspect that Robert and Noemi Rodriguez had a growing concern for both Noemi’s 53-year old brother, Willie Ramirez and his step-son Jimmie VanSickle, both of whom were mentally challenged.
About an hour passed and still no one had arrived to help the Rodriguez clan, so Noemi decided to call the Coast Guard.
The USCG is Not A Towing Service
We pick up what happened next from an official press release issued by the USCG two days later—
“A watchstander from Coast Guard Sector Corpus Christi received a call at 7:22 p.m. from a woman stating that their boat had become disabled with four persons on board. The caller never indicated that the boaters were in distress and the Coast Guard provided contact information for commercial salvage operators in the area. The Coast Guard does not normally provide rescue assistance in non-distress cases if alternative assistance is available because Coast Guard resources will not unnecessarily interfere with private enterprise.
“Coast Guard surface assets were unable to access the area due to shallow water and tried to facilitate immediate assistance by providing the names and phone numbers of commercial salvage companies in the area.”
Towing Services Were Refused
Noemi Rodriguez then talked first to Sea Tow and then Tow Boat/U.S. Both services explained that there would be a fee for towing. Capt. Jayson Wendt, the Sea Tow franchise owner in the area, explained what happened next on a local TV news broadcast after he told Rodriguez that the towing service charges $200 per hour—
“She [Noemi] refused our service on two occasions. We wanted to provide service. I then passed her back to the Coast Guard.” The local TV news station said that, “Sea Tow says that it would have worked with the family on the payment and that they handle hundreds of cases like this every year.”
We pick up again from the Coast Guard--
“The caller contacted both Sea Tow and Tow Boat U.S. and declined commercial salvage from both companies, electing to stay the night on the boat. Upon notification of their decision to decline salvage assistance, the Coast Guard made another call to a cell phone aboard the vessel and left a voicemail message requesting the boaters contact the Coast Guard.
“Weather at the time of the incident included 1 foot seas, 25 knot winds, and visibility reaching to 10 nautical miles.”
Jim King to the Rescue
Evidently the Coast Guard didn’t know that Debbie had finally located Jim King’s phone number, talked to him, and he was now out on the bay looking for the stricken boat. It was reportedly about six miles west of the bay bridge.
King called Rodriguez’s cell phone and asked where the helpless boat was. He then asked Robert if he had a flashlight. As luck would have it, Rodriguez did have a flashlight and it was working. Soon King saw the flash light, told Rodriguez to keep pointing it the same way and he sped off toward the light which he reckoned was about a mile away.
Then, all of a sudden the light went out.
“I guess that was when the boat capsized,” said king. He arrived at the capsized boat within a few minutes of the light going out and pulled three people out of the water and into his boat. But Willie Ramirez was nowhere to be found eventhough he had on his life vest.
The USCG Responds By Chopper
The Coast Guard picks up the story from there--
“At 8:40 p.m., Sector Corpus Christi received a call from the Corpus Christi Police Department reporting that the boat had capsized with three people in the water. Air Station Corpus Christi launched an MH-65C helicopter rescue crew.
“A good Samaritan picked up three survivors from the shallow waters before departing the scene due to low fuel. The Coast Guard helicopter rescue crew lowered the rescue swimmer to the water at the location of the capsized boat and the swimmer located a fourth person trapped underneath the vessel. Mr. Willie Ramirez, the 53-year-old male, was airlifted to Spohn Memorial hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.” [At 10:10 pm, according to a local news source.—Ed]
Debriefing By USCG Capt. Paulison
A local Corpus Christi news source, Call.com, reported the follow from an interview with Capt. Paulison:
Capt. Bob Paulison of the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Corpus Christi said that the USCG does not respond in cases such as this unless there is “eminent and immediate danger” to the boaters involved. Paulison said that the Coast Guard routinely gives out the phone numbers of Sea Tow and Tow Boat/U.S. “The Coast Guard is not intended to be a towing, refueling or mechanic service for boaters, but a first-responder in emergencies where lives are at risk,” he said.
“I can appreciate that the family is very upset,” Paulison said. “It’s upsetting to us too. We’re in the business of saving lives and we want to save every one of them. It is important to understand boating can go from good and under control to out of control in a split second.”
“If the situation were dire,” Paulison said, “the Coast Guard would not have been able to respond in the shallow waters of Nueces Bay and would have called on the Department of Parks and Wildlife to navigate the 4 foot to 5 foot depths.”
Because there was no indication of imminent danger, Paulison said the family should have used one of the tow services.
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