A U.S. Coast Guard helicopter team on Thursday rescued a man clinging to a cooler in the Gulf of Mexico after that boat became stranded overnight amid turmoil caused by Hurricane Milton.
The man, identified by officials only as “Capt. Dave,” was able to contact the Coast Guard on Monday to report that the fishing vessel he was working on had become disabled about 30 kilometers off John Pass, Florida.
A local Coast Guard crew, assisted by an Air Station Clearwater helicopter crew, flew in to airlift Captain Dave and another crew member to safety.
But around noon on Wednesday, the ship’s owner called officials to tell them that the captain had returned to the ship around 3 a.m. that day, hoping to make repairs and get the boat to safety.
Officials said just hours before the hurricane made landfall Contact made With Captain Dave, who reported that the boat’s rudder had become faulty and had become inoperable. Coast Guard personnel lost contact with him, but not before they were able to tell him to put on a life jacket and grab an emergency GPS.
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At the time, according to the Coast Guard, the captain was navigating his stricken boat through six- to eight-foot waves and winds of about 50 kilometers per hour, with conditions rapidly deteriorating as the storm approached.
On Thursday morning, as the storm moved away from Florida, searchers found the man about 50 kilometers off Longboat Key, clinging to an open cooler.
A video of the rescue shows a Coast Guard diver being lowered from a helicopter before swimming towards the man to pick him up.
A rescue crew is working to rescue a man spotted clinging to a cooler off the coast of Forida.
US Coast Guard
“This guy He survived in a nightmare scenario Even for the most experienced Sailors,” Lt. Cmdr. Dana Grady, head of the St. Petersburg Sector Command Center, said in a statement.
“To understand the severity of hurricane conditions, we estimate that it encountered winds of approximately 75 to 90 mph (120 to 150 km/h), and 20 to 25 feet offshore, for an extended period of time to include throughout the night,” Grady continued, estimating The man was in the water for about 24 hours.
“he He survived because of his life jacketits emergency location indicating locator beacon and radiator.
The man was taken to Tampa General Hospital for further care after the horrific ordeal.
Hurricane Milton rescue operations are continuing after the Category 3 storm tore through the Gulf of Mexico before leaving a trail of devastation across a wide swath of the Florida peninsula.
In a video posted to Facebook on Thursday, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office shared the rescue of a 14-year-old boy who was found clinging to debris after being stranded in floodwaters.
The video shows officers arriving by boat and pulling the teen from the water.
While Milton caused significant damage, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said the area was spared the worst-case scenarios officials feared.
Millions of Floridians remained without power on Friday.
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