PANAMA CITY — The Coast Guard assisted a man aboard a sailboat taking on water 70 nautical miles south of Panama City early Thursday.
Rescuers said the sailor was well-prepared for emergencies, including having equipment called an “emergency position indicating radio beacon,” which provides search-and-rescue crews with information such as phone numbers and the description and type of vessel to help reduce the time it takes to locate anyone in distress.
Watchstanders at Coast Guard Sector St. Petersburg received the first signal from the emergency radio beacon of the 37-foot sailboat “The Good Life” at 12:30 a.m. Thursday.
The registered owner of the vessel, Matthew Smith, was contacted and said the vessel was sold to Jeffrey McKittrick. Smith reported McKittrick departed Fort Myers three days ago for a trip to Mobile, Ala.
Along the way, the vessel lost power and began to slowly take on water more than 70 miles southwest of Cape San Blas, the Coast Guard said. McKittrick made a distress call on a hand-held VHF-FM radio and activated his emergency position indicating radio beacon.
Coast Guard Sector Mobile directed the launch of an aircraft from Mobile, a Coast Guard Station Panama City 45-foot response boat and the 87-foot Coast Guard Cutter Coho and crew to find the sailboat. The aircrew located the vessel and vectored the ships to its location. The 45-footer boat crew took McKittrick aboard, while the Coho took his vessel in tow.
“Prepared mariners like McKittrick make coordinating response efforts easy,” said Cmdr. Eric King, chief of response, Sector Mobile.
McKittrick’s emergency radio beacon provided his position and significantly reduced the search area, King said.