ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The search for five people believed to be aboard a fishing vessel that capsized in rough seas in the Gulf of Alaska has been suspended, the Coast Guard said Monday.
The search lasted nearly a day and covered more than 108 square nautical miles.
“We stand in sorrow and solidarity with the friends and family of the people we were not able to find over the past 24 hours,” Chief Warrant Officer James Koon, a search and rescue mission coordinator at Coast Guard Sector Southeast Alaska, said in a statement.
The Coast Guard began the search after the Wind Walker’s crew sent a Mayday call at 12:10 a.m. Sunday that the 50-foot (15-meter) boat was overturning off Point Couverden, southwest of Juneau. The Coast Guard tried to get more information as it mobilized a response, but the crew didn’t answer, according to a Coast Guard press release.
The state ferry Hubbard overheard the broadcast and reached the scene first, followed by a Coast Guard MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter and a response boat, according to the press release. A winter storm warning remained in effect as responders faced heavy snow, winds up to 60 mph (96 kph) and 6-foot (1.8-meter) seas.
Two Coast Guard cutters — the Healy and the Douglas Denman — joined the search. Responders found seven empty cold-water immersion suits and two strobe lights in the waters, but no other sign of the boat or its crew.
The helicopter crew spotted the cold-water immersion suits from the air near Spasski Bay, located about 10 miles (16 kilometers) southwest of Point Couverden. Four of the survival suits were in the waters of the bay and three were seen on land, Hightower said.
The suits were empty, and it was not immediately clear if they had been worn, he said.
The full-body suits are made of a neoprene-like material “that you can put on very quickly and easily over your clothes, and it’s meant to help you survive in cold water,” Coast Guard Petty Officer John Hightower said. They also have a floatation device inside them, along with an inflatable pillow so a person in the water can rest their head and remain afloat.
The area searched by the Healy and another cutter, the Douglas Denman, is fairly small since they had the Wind Walker’s emergency beacon GPS coordinates, Hightower said. Since the crew reported the ship was overturning, it’s possible it capsized and sank.
“That seems like the most likely but, you know, we try not to rule anything out since we haven’t been able to confirm it ourselves,” he said.
Up to 17 inches of snow fell in Juneau over the weekend, and the water temperature was about 45 degrees Fahrenheit (7.22 degrees Celsius), the National Weather Service in Juneau said.