One person was found alive and a body was recovered during a massive search effort Sunday along the Sonoma County coast for a group that was aboard a recreational vessel that capsized, officials said.
Four people were still missing Sunday night.
Helicopters, a plane, rescue boats and various state and local agencies, along with the California Air National Guard and the U.S. Coast Guard, are part of the search effort, which began late Saturday.
There were six people in total aboard a 21-foot Bayliner that took off to go crabbing at about 3 p.m. Saturday from the Westside Regional Park’s boat launch in Bodega Bay, officials said.
Saturday marked the first day of Dungeness Crab season.
The group consisted of five family members and a family friend from Corning, California, in Tehama County, according to U.S. Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Levi Read. It was not immediately clear whether the friend was a child or an adult.
The search began at about 10 p.m. Saturday after someone called the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office saying they had not heard from the group, according to Deputy Rob Dillion, a sheriff’s spokesman.
The Coast Guard was contacted about 11:40 p.m. Saturday, officials said.
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The search was stopped overnight and resumed at about 4 a.m. Sunday, Dillion said, adding that emergency personnel have found floating debris and life vests in various spots along the coast.
At about 8 a.m. Sunday, an 11-year-old child was found alive along South Salmon Creek Beach, north of Bodega Bay. The child was “receiving medical treatment.”
Read said that at about noon searchers came across the body of teenager in the water.
Searchers have continued looking Sunday for three adults and a child from the group, all of whom were wearing life vests, officials said.
Coastal deputies pinged the cellphone of one of the people on board the vessel and it came back near Carmet Beach in Bodega Bay.
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Crews appear to be spanning miles along the coastlines of Sonoma and Marin counties, stretching from the mouth of Tomales Bay to at least Carmet Beach, just south of Jenner, and the mouth of the Russian River, if not farther north.
Dillion said at least two aircraft were patrolling the area around Doran Beach and Tomales Bay.
He added that the 11-year-old, who was also wearing a vest, was interviewed by first responders and said the boat had capsized.
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On Saturday night through Sunday afternoon, wind gusts off the coast were 30 mph, which is a little strong but nothing out of the ordinary, said Rick Canepa, a National Weather Service meteorologist with the agency’s Monterey office.
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The weather service issued a small craft advisory Saturday night through 3 a.m. Monday for an area that included the area where the boat went missing. The Weather Service does not have a specific definition for a “small craft,” though some factors include the “experience of the vessel operator, and the type, overall size, and sea worthiness of the vessel.”
“Inexperienced mariners, especially those operating smaller vessels, should avoid navigating in hazardous conditions,” the advisory states.
The water temperature around Bodega Bay Saturday night and Sunday was around 54 degrees, officials said.
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At that temperature, people in the water for sometime can experience cold water shock — causing dramatic changes to heart rate, breathing and blood pressure — and can quickly develop hypothermia, especially if they are moving around more and exposing more of their body to the water.
“It can be overwhelming to try to survive those conditions,” Canepa said.
A beach hazards alert went into effect at 3 p.m. Sunday for the coastal North Bay due to a conditions that could create dangerous breaking waves of 10 to 14 feet, according to the weather service.
This could mean an increase in the chance for rip currents, which are strong and narrow currents that flow away from shore, as well as sneaker waves that move quickly toward shore and can sweep people into the ocean, forecasters added.
The hazardous conditions could affect search operations but personnel will continue until dangerous conditions materialize, if they do, Dillion said.
“It is completely dependent on what Mother Nature throws at us in combination with what we are able to do with personnel,” he said.
All of the agencies are “working independently for a common goal” of finding the missing people, Dillion said.
Around 10:30 a.m. Sunday, beachgoers along Dillon Beach said they saw multiple helicopters hovering over the mouth of Tomales Bay and then flying north along the coastline toward Bodega Bay and Doran Beach.
They described the helicopters as flying low to the water over the heads of the few surfers bobbing in the waves off Dillon Beach, perhaps 100 feet above the water.
A military plane searched just offshore there, as well, witnesses said, adding that it was circling from the edge of Tomales Point — the northern tip of Point Reyes National Seashore, toward Dillon Beach and the bay mouth.
California State Parks personnel and UTVs, the Sheriff’s Office helicopter Henry-1 and the marine unit, Sonoma County Fire District and the county search and rescue team are also searching the area around Bodega Bay.
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