Peril and Heroism In the Gulf of Alaska

U.S. Coast Guard crews have rescued four people in two separate incidents spanning the breadth of the Gulf of Alaska. 

On 02 July, watchstanders at the USCG’s 17th District command center in Juneau, Alaska received a request for assistance from Pacific Producer, a 167-foot fishing vessel operating 6 miles west of the Egegik River on the northwestern [proximal] reach of Alaska’s Aleutian Peninsula. The ship requested assistance for a female crew-member reportedly experiencing sepsis-like symptoms. 

Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak—located on the northeast shore of Kodiak Island, approximately 192-statute miles southeast of the Pacific Producer‘s position—dispatched an HC-130 Hercules and an MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter to evacuate the stricken seafarer. 

Upon arriving on-scene, the Hercules provided onsite communication while the helicopter-crew hoisted the woman from the Pacific Producer and transported her to a hospital in Dillingham—a flight of approximately seventy-miles.

The second incident, which occurred on 04 July, saw watchstanders at the U.S. Coast Guard’s Sector Juneau command center receive a VHF report from the commercial fishing vessel Miss Amy, which reported it was taking on water in the vicinity of Lisianski Strait and Porcupine Rock—approximately thirty-miles south of Glacier Bay National Park. 

The Sector Juneau watchstanders—in addition to rerouting the Coast Guard Cutter Bailey Barco to Miss Amy’s position—issued an Urgent Marine Information Broadcast (UMIB) directing the launch of an MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter from Air Station Sitka.

Two good Samaritan vessels—the Cirus and Lucky Strike—responded to the UMIB and made best-speed to render assistance to the stricken craft—which was foundering approximately five-miles offshore and would eventually sink in one-hundred-fifty-feet of water.

All three of Miss Amy’s passengers went into the water and were rescued by the good Samaritan vessels. 

Fog and limited visibility precluded the Cirus’s and Lucky Strike’s leaving the vicinity of the sunken vessel. Ergo, the trio of survivors was hoisted aboard the Jayhawk helicopter and transported to Sitka for medical care—a flight, yet again, of approximately seventy-miles. 

Petty Officer 2nd Class Matt Bitinas of Sector Juneau command center stated: "We're especially grateful to good Samaritan vessels Cirus and Lucky Strike, which responded to our broadcast for help and rescued the survivors who went into the water after their vessel sank. Their quick response saved three lives."

FMI: www.uscg.mil