CLEVELAND — U.S. Coast Guard and Canadian Coast Guard crews teamed together to rescue four boaters whose boat started taking on water in the vicinity of Grenadier Island, Ontario, Canada, near the St. Lawrence Seaway early Sunday afternoon.
At 12:54 p.m., a search-and-rescue coordinator at Coast Guard Sector Buffalo, N.Y., overheard a broadcast from Joint Rescue Coordination Centre Trenton, Ontario, Canada, with the broadcast stating a 36-foot vessel with four people aboard was taking on water.
Although RCC Trenton was the search-and-rescue mission coordinator, Sector Buffalo directed the launch of a rescue boatcrew from Coast Guard Station Alexandria Bay, N.Y. A rescue boatcrew aboard a 25-foot Response Boat-Small quickly responded and arrived on scene with the distressed boaters and started assisting them by putting over a P-6 dewatering pump. As the boat was being dewatered, the Canadian Coast Guard 47-foot rescue boat Cape Hearn arrived on scene and relieved the Station Alexandria Bay boatcrew.
The rescue crew aboard the Cape Hearn returned the P-6 dewatering pump to the U.S. Coast Guard boatcrew and continued to assist the boaters. The Alexandria Bay boatcrew returned to base once the Cape Hearn crew had the flooding under control.
“Because we share a national border with Canada, and we share waterways like the St. Lawrence Seaway, it takes a lot of coordination to pull successful rescues off,” said Paul Angelillo, a search-and-rescue coordinator at Sector Buffalo. “But because we train together and work these cases together all the time, we trust each other in all aspects of the search-and-rescue coordination process.”
