Coast Guard Aide to Navigation Team Woods Hole 20-foot boat crew transiting to Nonsmesset Island, MA on Aug. 10, 2016. (U.S. Coast Guard photo by Petty Officer 2nd Class Douglas Meade)
BOSTON — The Coast Guard rescued four people stranded on Monamesset Island Wednesday after their 23-foot center console ran aground.
At about 10:40 a.m., an employee from a commercial towing company called Coast Guard Sector Southeastern New England watchstanders reporting the boat ran aground and four people needed assistance.
At approximately 10:45 a.m., Coast Guard Station Woods Hole launched a 45-foot response boat crew. When they arrived on scene, the boat crew could not reach the people stranded on the beach due to the shallow, rocky area. The crew dispatched a rescue swimmer who swam to the beach with the intention of bringing each person back to the boat, but the seas were 1-2 feet and not safe enough to transit back and forth.
At about 12:15 p.m., a Coast Guard Aids to Navigation Team Woods Hole boat crew launched their 20-foot shallow draft boat to assist. The rescue swimmer from Station Woods Hole brought the group to a cove about a half mile north of where they were stranded. The shallow-draft boat crew picked up the rescue swimmer and the center console crew and brought them back Great Harbor in Woods Hole.
“It definitely was not the calmest day,” said Petty Officer 2nd Class Douglas Mead, a crew member on Station Woods Hole’s 45-foot boat. “We had a decent chop and strong current, which made getting in close difficult.”
There were no reported injuries and a commercial towing company was able to dislodge the boat and tow it back to Inner Harbor in Falmouth.
