Rescuers hold out hope of finding missing Florida teens boaters

[Jazzy]

The search for two 14-year-old boys from South Florida who disappeared while on a fishing trip in the Atlantic Ocean entered a seventh day on Thursday amid questions about whether the U.S. Coast Guard would soon consider ending the operation.

"This is 100 percent still a search and rescue. It's not going to be a recovery just yet," said Petty Officer Jon-Paul Rios.

Coast Guard Captain Mark Fedor visited the families of Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen on Wednesday to refute an erroneous news report that the search for the boys was being called off. The families have been given daily updates by telephone since Friday, Rios said.

Authorities had searched 40,000 square nautical miles, an area about the size of Arkansas or North Carolina, by Wednesday evening but found no sign of the boys.

The search has been extended to Charleston, South Carolina, 500 miles north and 100 miles out to sea from Jupiter, Florida, where the teens launched their boat on Friday afternoon.

The last confirmed sighting of Stephanos and Cohen, who were fishing buddies and neighbors in Palm Beach County, Florida, occurred on Friday afternoon as they were buying fuel in Jupiter.

Jupiter commercial fisherman Jim Dulin told the Palm Beach Post that he was surprised on Friday afternoon to see what he now suspects was the boys’ boat heading out to sea at the same time other boats were heading in the opposite direction for safety as a visible line of thunderstorms approached.

Their overturned 19-foot boat was found two days later 180 miles north of Jupiter. One life vest was found by the boat.

Source

If they were not found with the boat, this doesn't bode well for their chances. I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure that rule #1 would be to stay with the boat, if at all possible. Makes a bigger target for locating. So sad for all concerned. You try to give your children a little freedom as they age (they were told no open water), and you trust that they will follow your rules. Sad but true...7 days in open water, even if they had flotation devices you got a better chance to win the lottery then to survive that long.

Your thoughts?

 

[DrLeftover]

JULY 31, 2015, 3:43 P.M. E.D.T.
'Gut-Wrenching' Decision: Search for Teens to Be Suspended
OPA-LOCKA, Fla. — After hundreds of rescue workers fanned out across a massive swath of the Atlantic for a full week, the Coast Guard's search for two teenage fishermen was to end Friday, a heart-rending decision for families so convinced the boys could be alive they're pressing on with their own hunt.

Even as officials announced at noon that the formal search-and-rescue effort would end at sundown, private planes and boats were preparing to keep scouring the water hoping for clues on what happened to the 14-year-old neighbors, Perry Cohen and Austin Stephanos.

Capt. Mark Fedor called the decision to suspend the search "excruciating and gut-wrenching." He suggested what long had been feared by observers — that the boys had surpassed any reasonable period of survivability — with his offering of "heartfelt condolences."

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/07/31/us/ap-us-missing-teen-fishermen.html

 

[Nebulous]

I hope they find them!

 

[WHO IS SERAFIN]

I think they probably died the moment the boat capsized for whatever reason. Now the people who think government can fix everything are screaming for more laws and boating.