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January 30, 2007

Divers tend to sunken N.B. fishing boat

A dive team was in the waters of Nantucket Sound this morning, plugging vents and working to mitigate any pollution from the sunken fishing vessel the Lady of Grace, out of New Bedford, which ran into trouble Friday night with four fishermen aboard.

The Coast Guard in Woods Hole, Mass., sent out a small boat to provide a safety zone around those divers, chief petty officer Scott Carr of the Coast Guard’s first district said this morning.

The boat’s captain and three-member crew had cut their eight-day trip for groundfish in half and headed back toward New Bedford Friday afternoon, heeding warnings form the Coast Guard about single-digit temperatures, lashing winds of 45 knots and 22-foot seas. The 75-foot dragger was apparently overcome with ice.

The one body that was recovered, yesterday afternoon, was taken to the state Medical Examiner’s Office and has not yet been identified. Late Saturday, Coast Guard search crews using sonar and underwater cameras discovered the boat in 36 feet of water on the bottom of Nantucket Sound. They were drawn to the area by an oil slick about 11 nautical miles north of Nantucket.

Today, the state police may send out an additional dive team to search the area for the other three bodies, Carr said. However, such a decision will be made only after consultation with the Coast Guard, the district attorney’s office and insurance companies connected with the boat, state police Sgt. Robert Bousquet said today.

The Coast Guard mitigates the environmental concerns associated with a sunken vessel that contained fuel, Bousquet said. However, salvage operations and pollution prevention “would ultimately be the responsibility of the owner of the vessel,” Carr said. Jaime Santos of New Bedford is the boat’s owner.

Lost at sea were the boat’s captain, Antonio Barroqueiro, and his crew – Rogerio Vendura, Mario Farinha and João Silva.

-- projo.com staff writer Kate Bramson

Posted by Kate Bramson  at 12:02 PM | Permalink

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