Yacht Sunk by Barge - Search for Bodies

by Tom Smith, Times Daily on 29 Mar 2008 Search and rescue efforts continue in an effort to locate a yacht that collided with a barge Thursday evening in the US state of Alabama.

Divers from the Florence Police and Lauderdale and Colbert county Emergency Management Agencies were deployed back to Wilson Lake around 7 a.m. in an effort to locate the boat, which has been described as a yacht, that sank after being stuck by an eastbound tugboat that was pushing barges.

Authorities said the body of a 59-year-old Sheffield man was located in the river Thursday evening around 10:15 p.m. Officials were not releasing the name of the victim until relatives could be notified.

Rescue workers brought the victim's body to shore at the boat launch at Lock Six Road in Killen, where he was pronounced dead by Lauderdale County Coroner Andy High.

Lauderdale EMA director George Grabryan said the search was suspended around 12;30 a.m. this morning. He said officials with the U.S. Coast Guard's Nashville office, arrived at the Fleet Harbor Boat Ramp on the TVA Reservation around 1 a.m.

Grabryan said Coast Guard officials talked with the crew of the tugboat and assessed the situation.

After the accident the barge came to rest and was visible from homes in Indian Springs and Kendall Gardens subdivisions in Florence.

The barge stopped on the east shore across from the Sky Park area of the lake.

Jim Longshore, a resident of Kendall Gardens, said he returned home just after 8 p.m. and turned on his marine radio in time to hear the tugboat captain reporting the accident.

'He said he was the captain of the Potomac and that he had just locked through Wilson Lock at about 8,' Longshore said. 'He said he had just run over a large pleasure boat at mile 262.5 — that's about three miles above Wilson Lock — and that he thought he had sunk them.'

Longshore said the tugboat captain reported that he saw no survivors and wasn't sure if the boat had run in front of the barge or had been sitting still in the water.

Several residents in the area who own boats took their boats out to search for survivors, Longshore said.

Authorities set up a command post at Fleet Harbor on the TVA Reservation and also used the Lock Six boat ramp to put rescue boats in the water.

Lauderdale County Emergency Management Agency Director George Grabryan said the barge was going east. He said waters were calm during the initial search but that the darkness and increasing winds were hampering factors.

A state trooper helicopter was used Thursday night to fly over Wilson Lake in hopes of spotting wreckage. Grabryan said sonar equipment also was being used in the water to locate wreckage.

Agencies involved in the search included TVA police, marine police, Florence police, Lauderdale County EMA, Florence Rescue and the state troopers.

Tom Smith can be reached at +1-740-5757 or tom.smith@timesdaily.com.