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3 rescued from a sunken boat
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Posted on Feb 19 2009
Authorities and a group of civilians rescued three persons from a sunken 16-foot sailboat outside the reef near Sugar Dock in Chalan Kanoa Tuesday morning.
Department of Public Safety spokesperson Lei Ogumoro said yesterday that the victims—69-year-old Lino Olopai and a certain Michael and Miss Shoyu—were not injured.
Ogumoro said Boating Safety officers discovered that the boat owner, Olopai, violated CNMI Boating Safety laws as he did not have any personal floatation devices aboard.
Ogumoro said that, on Tuesday at 11:09am, DPS received a call of a capsized boat located outside the reef near Sugar Dock.
DPS Boating Safety Section officers and Commonwealth Ports Police officers launched the Ports Police rescue boat for the rescue.
When the officers arrived at the scene, they observed that the sailboat was partially in the water just outside the reef. The officers also saw two boats already next to the sailboat.
One of the two boats, operated by Judd Palacios, handed over the female, identified as a certain Shoyu, a Chinese, whom Palacios had rescued from the sunken vessel.
Two other male passengers—Olopai and Michael—remained with the partially sunken boat.
When the officers arrived at the scene, another boat operated by Hozumi Miyayauchi and Joseph D. Aldan, was already preparing to tow the distressed vessel back to shore.
Miyayauchi’s boat towed the vessel to shore while officers escorted the two other boats.
Olopai and Shoyu were also brought back to the beach area.
