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Paulina
Ultra Nomad
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Registered: 8-31-2002
Location: BCN
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| Quote: | Originally posted by MexicoTed
Family and friends of the missing 7 fishermen will still continue to change the DOD's mind on a dive by a military special dive team, but also they
are trying to collect funds for both a private dive, most likely a submersible, and also possibly a private search by boat and plane farther south in
the LA Bay area.
Anyone have any contacts in either of those possibilities?
Ted |
I have contributed towards their search by donating through Paypal. Info at findourfathers.com
I wish them the best.
P>*)))>{
\"Well behaved women rarely make history.\" Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
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bajajurel
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If you can, read the article that came out in Western Outdoor News this week. They had interviews with several of the survivors. It will open your
eyes!
bajajurel
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Stickers
Senior Nomad
Posts: 571
Registered: 4-12-2006
Location: SoCal
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Here it is:
http://www.wonews.com/t-VesselErikSinks110708.aspx
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bullmello
Newbie
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| Quote: | Originally posted by bajajurel
If you can, read the article that came out in Western Outdoor News this week. They had interviews with several of the survivors. It will open your
eyes! |
Some of my worst fears were confirmed by the eyewitness survivor accounts in that article. I'm still in a quandary regarding the inability of the
captain to keep the bow pointed directly into the waves.
Sorry, but it is still my contention that this boat was run by a shoddy operation with little concern for safety. Hats off to the guys on this trip
with the forethought to bring their own life vests. That was a wise decision, especially considering this operation.
Wonder why officials boarded the boat at SF before departure? Wonder if we will ever really know.
Glad to see WON is doing a good job reporting this story and thanks to bajajurel and Stickers for posting it here.
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Dave
Elite Nomad
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| Quote: | Originally posted by bajajurel
If you can, read the article that came out in Western Outdoor News this week. They had interviews with several of the survivors. It will open your
eyes! |
"It was gross negligence. The more you dissect it, the more you see that the crew was not trained in anything. No communication to the crew by the
captain, not enough life jackets, no radio call, and no attempt by the crew to wake up the passengers. We just want to keep the pressure on, to find
the guys, and to make sure people know what happened on that boat and why it happened.”
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Skipjack Joe
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Location: Bahia Asuncion
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There should be jail time for someone for all this.
Not for those who were unable to handle the boat properly but for those who left the passengers to fend for themselves as it went down. There wasn't
even an attempt to provide them with life vests or warn them of the danger. Every crew member had a life vest but nothing for the passengers? That's
criminal.
Hopefully justice will be served rather than a lot of finger pointing and "I didn't know"s . Somebody is responsible.
I'm sure there will be many accounts to follow.
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BajaNews
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Friends of missing Baja fishermen push for dive team
http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20110718/ARTICLES/11071...
By LORI A. CARTER
July 18, 2011
Friends of a Petaluma man missing since a July 3 boating disaster off the Baja California coast are working to fund a private dive to the sunken boat.
Lorie Goldbeck, a friend of fisherman Shawn Chaddock, said Monday she and others also are trying to pressure elected officials to call for a U.S.
Coast Guard “salvage dive” to the Erik, a 105-foot chartered fishing boat that sank during a fierce nighttime storm in the Sea of Cortez.
Chaddock, 49, an auto mechanic, and retired Pacific Bell worker Russ Bautista, 60, of Penngrove are among seven Americans still unaccounted for after
the sinking.
Goldbeck said if authorities approve a search of the vessel before a private dive team can be arranged, all money raised will be split between the
families of the seven missing men. The other five are from the greater Bay Area.
“Our hope is the Coast Guard will do a salvage dive of the boat, but we have no idea when that might be,” Goldbeck said Monday.
The Coast Guard and Mexican Navy covered more than 7,000 square miles during a nine-day search for survivors. But with no success, authorities
officially suspended the search July 12.
Goldbeck is working with the families and friends of the other missing men to hold fundraisers at restaurants, mostly in the South Bay so far, to pay
for a private dive team.
They started an online petition and a web site - http://www.findourfathers.com - to pressure officials to keep looking. Goldbeck said about $14,000 has been raised.
Bautista and Chaddock were with a group of six Sonoma County men who drove to Baja California for what was supposed to be a six-day fishing adventure
over the Fourth of July holiday. The four other Sonoma County men were rescued after the sinking.
Goldbeck said she will distribute fliers at this week's Santa Rosa Wednesday Night Market seeking help. Anyone wishing to help or donate can reach
Goldbeck 707-292-7200 or send email to goldbecks@sbcglobal.net.
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BajaNews
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Families seek dive for 7 missing Americans on sunken Mexican boat
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/US/07/27/california.families.boa...
By Michael Martinez
July 27, 2011
Los Angeles (CNN) -- More than three weeks after seven California men went missing when the fishing vessel Erik sank in Mexico's Sea of Cortez, the
families of the missing Americans are expressing anger with the U.S. and Mexican governments for not conducting a dive to find the sunken boat -- and
possibly the bodies entombed beneath the sea.
The sinking of the 115-foot sport fishing boat during a predawn storm on July 3 captured widespread attention because the 27 passengers were nearly
all friends and acquaintances who fished on the Erik as an annual outing, some for as long as 15 years or so. All were from northern California,
relatives said.
Only five of them were first-timers on a five-night trip aboard the Erik, during which the sportsmen would venture deep into the sea aboard smaller
pangas in search of yellowfin tuna and dorado, relatives said. Most of the 27 were Asian-American men from the San Francisco Bay area and nearby,
relatives said.
Those close ties heightened the depth of the tragedy, especially as U.S. and Mexican authorities spent nine days searching the vast expanse of the Sea
of Cortez.
In addition to the seven missing men, Leslie Yee, 63, died in the incident. Among the survivors, several were rescued from a Mexican beach. One person
was rescued from a coastal island.
The families have expressed frustration with the investigation. A State Department official said the U.S. Coast Guard and the National Transportation
Safety Board are helping Mexican authorities with the probe.
Still, the families say they are disturbed that there was apparently no mayday issued during the sinking of the Erik. Also, the boat apparently didn't
carry a satellite tracking device that's often deployed when a boat is in distress, relatives say.
In their social media and website campaign to attract public attention to their plight, the families have become so exasperated with the two
governments' apparent reluctance to conduct a dive 200 feet beneath the sea that they are trying to raise money to execute a privately funded dive --
if they can raise enough funds on their "Find Our Fathers" website and if the Mexican government will allow the dive.
The families are haunted by unanswered questions, their representatives say: Did the 16-member crew abandon ship without trying to help the
passengers? Did the vessel have enough life preservers? Why did it take 16 hours before a search and rescue was launched?
"We don't want any other families to go through the pain we went through. This should not have happened at all," said May Lee of San Ramon,
California. Her husband, Don, 62, an assistant parts manager at General Motors in nearby San Leandro, is among the seven missing.
"There's still a little bit of me that's hoping my husband is on some remote little island with some of his buddies," Lee told CNN on Tuesday.
But the families have become demoralized. On Sunday, they will gather for the first time since the accident; at a hotel in northern California, Lee
said.
"Some of them are very depressed, but I'm doing my darnedest to try to bring people together. I'm trying to give them as much hope as possible, to
make sure we're hanging on," Lee said.
In regular conference calls with the State Department as recently as Friday, the families have asked for the U.S. military to conduct a dive. Most
recently, they have pressed U.S. officials to ask the governor of Baja California to fund a dive -- or at least to grant permission for the American
families to carry out a private dive.
The whereabouts of the sunken Erik are unknown, and the boat could be drifting somewhere on the sea bed, said Lee's daughter, Mandi Lee-Han, a
34-year-old preschool teacher. The boat capsized 60 miles south of San Felipe, Mexico, about two miles offshore, during the first night of the trip.
A State Department official said the U.S. Department of Defense doesn't have the capability or equipment to do a deepwater dive and search for the
fishing boat -- and it would have to pay for a private contract to do so. The official asked not to be identified, saying he wasn't authorized to
speak to the media on the matter.
The details of the Coast Guard's and NTSB's joining the Mexican investigation into the Erik are being worked out, the official told CNN Tuesday.
"When they were on the call," the official said about the families, "we expressed condolences for the loss of life. Unfortunately, the DOD has limited
capability to operate at that depth" beneath the sea in a dive and search.
"When a U.S. citizen goes missing in a foreign country, the host government takes the lead in search and recovery efforts, often with the help of U.S.
government agencies, such as the U.S. Coast Guard, who have the necessary experience and mandate," the official said. "The Department of State will
monitor such efforts and work to ensure that the host government does its utmost to locate the missing person, but lacks the capacity and authority to
conduct search and rescue operations."
But the families aren't satisfied.
"It feels as though the Mexican navy is not really sharing with them what is happening," Lee-Han told CNN.
The six other missing men are Russell Bautista of Penngrove, California; Shawn Chaddock of Petaluma, Calif.; Mark Dorland of Twain Harte, California;
Gene Leong of Dublin, California; Brian Wong of Berkeley, California; and Albert Mein, 62, a retired AT&T manager, of Twain Harte.
Mein was also Don Lee's brother-in-law, said May Lee, who works in the city hall of Fremont, California, overseeing a first-time homebuyer program and
housing ordinances.
Families have received messages on their Facebook page that local Mexicans have taken the initiative to search coastal islands for the missing seven
Americans, posting reports on which islands they've searched.
"This grassroot effort is someone knows someone knows someone," said Lee-Han.
She said the families are distressed to learn of what they describe as safety shortcomings aboard the Erik.
"Had we known there were all these problems in Mexico, we wouldn't have sent my father on this trip. We felt blindsided to some degree," Lee-Han said.
"What we're really trying to achieve here is to honor my father and all of the men that deserve to come back to their families," Lee-Han said.
The families want the Erik found -- to see what safety problems the vessel may have had, relatives said.
"We most certainly don't want to harm the economy in Mexico, but at the same time, we want assurance from Mexico that if something is going to happen,
that they're going to be responsible for whatever that may be," Lee-Han said. "If there is an investigation that's going to take place, we would hope
that the Mexican government would do a thorough investigation, and that would include a dive."
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bent-rim
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Location: Marin County
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One of the missing fishermen, Don Lee, tackle box was returned to his family in San Ramon yesterday. Several Mexican fisherman found the tackle box
while netting crabs, they recognized the name and turned the tackle box over to the caretaker of a local house. The owner's of the house, from
Pleasenton, returned the box to Lee's family at a fund raiser at a Chevy's restaurant to raise funds to hire divers to try to find the wreckage of the
Erik. The family was very grateful for the return of the tackle box. The Chevy's restaurant was one of five local restaurants holding a fundraiser
for the families of the missing fishermen Tuesday night.
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MrBillM
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Uh, Yeah, Sure
"If there is an investigation that's going to take place, we would hope that the Mexican government would do a thorough
investigation, and that would include a dive."
And, an Ant CAN Move a Rubber-Tree Plant.
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BajaNomad
Super Administrator
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http://forums.bajanomad.com/viewthread.php?tid=56777
When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
– Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel
We know we must go back if we live, and we don`t know why.
– John Steinbeck, Log from the Sea of Cortez
Affordable Domain Name Registration/Management & cPanel Web Hosting:
https://www.regionalinternet.com |
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southaz
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The ERIK
The ERIK has been found. Here is an article from the San Felipe area website:
http://sanfelipe.com.mx/2012/06/14/the-sunken-sport-fishing-...
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thebajarunner
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3687
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They held a memorial for one of the missing men (I believe it was Leong) last month here in Oakdale at one of the large churches.
I did not attend, but drove by that afternoon and there were many cars in the parking lot.
Very sad.
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burnrope
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Given the ingenuity of Mexicans, I'm sure it will be sea worthy in no time.
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woody with a view
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awesome! hopefully the families will get a measure of closure. one way or the other.
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David K
Honored Nomad
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That was a night we won't forget... when a most beautiful day and early evening was hit by the devil wind, and it didn't stop until morning! That Baja
Warrior rode his wave runner out to the Erik as it motored by Shell Island and Bahia Santa Maria that beautiful day, was ... (not sure of the right
word to use) mystical?
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rglansing
Newbie
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ERIK has been found.
News from the San Felipe web site says the ERIK has been FOUND.
http://sanfelipe.com.mx/2012/06/14/the-sunken-sport-fishing-...
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bajajurel
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San Diego Union Tribune posting -
http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2012/jun/14/vessel-that-capsi...
Nearly a year after the sinking of a charter fishing vessel in the Gulf of California south of San Felipe, family members of seven missing U.S. men
say they have found the wreckage, a high-ranking Baja California official said Thursday.
The missing men were all passengers aboard the 115-foot vessel Erik, which capsized July 3 in a sudden storm with 43 people on board. Thirty-five
people survived, including the 16-member crew. One passenger, Leslie K. Yee, was found dead, but seven others were never accounted for. Most of the
passengers were from the San Francisco Bay area, friends who had driven down for what was to be a six-day fishing trip.
The state official would not give his name because he was not an authorized spokesman for the families. He said that the wreckage had been found 48
meters—more than 150 feet—beneath the surface by private divers hired by the families to conduct a search in the vicinity of where the boat sank about
60 miles south of San Felipe.
The Mexican Navy does not have equipment to dive that deep, the official said, but had provided a vessel o assist with the search.
The Contra Costa Times reported the discovery Thursday, quoting family members of the missing men.
bajajurel
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southaz
Newbie
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Registered: 6-14-2012
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Here's more news on the ERIK:
http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_20869435/how-man...
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BornFisher
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Great article, thanks
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