A day of red snapper fishing in the Gulf of Mexico turned into an emergency rescue in early June 2014, after a Mississippi angler answered a distress call and ferried three burn victims toward help near the mouth of Mobile Bay.
The fisherman, a 41-year-old Hattiesburg, Mississippi, resident, was preparing to head back to shore aboard his 36-foot boat when he heard a request broadcast from overhead: the U.S. Coast Guard needed a vessel to reach a boat that had briefly caught fire somewhere south of Petit Bois Island, Mississippi, and to help move its passengers to safety. His boat was the one within range to respond, so he turned back west toward the scene.
Passengers Suffered Severe Burns
When he arrived, he found the disabled boat adrift with its engine hatch raised, surrounded by other vessels that had also stopped to help. Three passengers aboard the smaller, 24-foot boat, an older man, a woman, and a teenage girl, all appeared to have suffered severe burns, with the woman’s injuries looking the worst of the three.
Rescuers moved the injured passengers onto the angler’s boat, laying them on bean bags and wrapping towels around them to keep them as comfortable as possible for the roughly hour-long trip to a rendezvous point with the Coast Guard about 10 miles south of the Mobile Bay ship channel. During the trip, the angler said he could see the skin beginning to peel on the victims’ legs within about 30 minutes, an unsettling sign of how serious the burns were.
Fumes Sparked the Fire
According to the angler’s account, only fumes from the smaller boat’s engine had ignited, rather than a fuel tank explosion. That vessel was later towed back to Mississippi waters once the passengers had been safely transferred.
Treatment and Aftermath
At least two of the injured passengers were taken to a Mobile hospital for treatment of second-degree burns, though full details on all three victims’ conditions and identities were not immediately released.
The rescue underscored how quickly recreational boaters along the Gulf Coast can find themselves called into service during an emergency, particularly during the busy summer boating season when the waters off Dauphin Island and Mobile Bay see heavy fishing and pleasure-craft traffic. Coast Guard crews and civilian boaters alike frequently work together on Gulf rescues, especially when a Coast Guard vessel isn’t the closest asset able to reach the scene quickly. The incident became one of several water-rescue stories to emerge from the Mobile Bay area that summer, as boat traffic around Dauphin Island and the surrounding Gulf waters remained heavy through the warm months.