I don’t do the facebook, but someone sent me this via text message so I thought I would respond here instead.
The Coast Guard Addendum to Search and Rescue requires that the entire Coast Guard indiscriminately responds to unmanned adrift boats as a person in the water until they can conclude otherwise. The pan-pan was issued to keep mariners informed of the situation and to keep a lookout of a potential person in the water. It is a robust response for a boat that likely just broke anchor, which happens a LOT in Charleston, SC. Fortunately in this case, a 29’ response boat was dispatched and located the boat with the owner on board resetting the anchor. DOT, Charleston County Dispatch and SC State Patrol were also notified of the incident. Nothing about this report was taken lightly.
Rest assured, all adrift boats are treated as a potential person in the water in the initial stages of a response. If I fell overboard and my boat drifted into a bridge, that’s exactly how I’d want the Coast Guard to respond.
Cheers and be safe out there!
