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Sport-Fishing Boat Destroyed on Reef off Mag Bay
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20021205-9999_2m5bo...
By Ed Zieralski
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
December 5, 2002
A San Diego-based passenger sport-fishing boat was declared a total loss by its owner-captain yesterday after it ran into a reef Tuesday night off
Magdalena Bay in southern Baja.
Mike Diamond, captain of the 75-foot boat Champ, and a crewman were the only ones on board. Neither was injured, Diamond said.
The boat hit the reef while turning sharply around a point north of Magdalena Bay, Diamond said yesterday by phone from San Carlos, a remote Mexican
fishing village 150 miles north of the tip of Baja.
Diamond said he was en route to pick up passengers who were there for a camping and fishing trip. He said the vessel, valued at nearly $1 million, was
being hammered and broken up by the surf yesterday.
Diamond spoke with Bob Fletcher, president of the Sportfishing Association of California, and Phil Lobred, part owner and general manager of H&M
Landing. Diamond ran the Champ out of H&M Landing this year until moving to Mexico to run a fish camp at Magdalena Bay.
"Mike said the boat was a total loss," Lobred said. "I asked him if he could remove it from the beach, but he said the weather down there was doing a
pretty good job of that. He's trying to find a salvage company down there to help him out."
Fletcher said Diamond told him the boat's keel was driven into the hull.
"He said the engine room filled with water pretty fast," Fletcher said.
A nearby ship picked up the pair, Fletcher said.
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Unsinkable Diamond looking for new boat
http://www.signonsandiego.com/sports/20021208-9999_1s8outdoo...
By Ed Zieralski
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
December 8, 2002
Mike Diamond says he never so much as scraped a boat as a captain or dented a plane as an airline pilot, but that changed Tuesday night off Baja.
Diamond, a former American Airlines pilot, drove his 75-foot sport boat, the Champ, into a reef off Punta Hughes at the north end of Bahia Santa
Maria, north of Magdalena Bay. Diamond and his crew managed to get away safely as the boat broke up in the high surf.
The boat is a total loss.
Diamond, who has been in the sportfishing business for 27 years, said Friday he intends to be back with another boat by May 15, the start of his 2003
season.
"I've lost a hull, and it's like losing a family member," Diamond said. "But I have three kids and a wife to support. I'm not giving up. I lost a
hull, but I didn't lose the business. I'll be back with a comparable boat or better one by May 15."
Diamond said the boat was fully insured. He spent most of Friday trying to initiate a deal for another boat and said he is close to making an offer.
He was inspired by news that another boat owner already had inquired about his berth at H&M Landing at Point Loma. (Before moving the Champ to Baja
and running under a Mexican flag for a series of "Camp and Champ" surfing and fishing trips, Diamond had been operating out of the landing.)
"I'm not going to give up my berth at H&M Landing," Diamond said. "I've worked 27 years at the docks in Florida and here, so I'm not about to chuck it
in because I lost a hull. I'm sick about losing the boat. It was the smallest long-range boat in the fleet."
In addition to looking for a new boat, Diamond was busy Friday filling out U.S. Coast Guard reports, required for any accident at sea by a U.S. boat.
Diamond was operating as a Mexican boat at the time, but he still must fill out Coast Guard reports.
Diamond said he was on his first "Camp and Champ" trip of the season, en route to picking up passengers when the Champ struck a reef. Brave pangeros
drove into a huge swell and rescued Diamond and his crew and off-loaded as much equipment as they could before the boat broke up.
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