High winds and water cold enough to kill were no match for a Coast Guardsman who swam out into high seas to answer a distress call.
During the wee hours of Tuesday morning, a Coast Guard helicopter was called to save the crew of a floundering 52-foot commercial shrimp fishing boat.
The vessel had lost power and was taking on water, and the four-person crew had abandoned ship; they were bobbing aboard a life raft in 5-foot waves off the Oregon coast when the helicopter arrived.
The copter lowered Petty Officer 2nd Class Darren Harrity into the 57-degree water. Normally, he would have attached a harness to each of the castaways to lift them back to the helicopter, but the hoist broke – the chopper couldn’t pick up any of the survivors.
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