Crews worked this morning to salvage a pleasure boat that sank off the 31st Street Harbor in Chicago.
It was one of at least four boats that got into trouble in the fog over the holiday weekend in the same area.
The operator of one boat didn’t know how to use navigation equipment, according to a witness.
It hit a break-wall and was beached at 31st Street and was later towed to the harbor.
At least two other boats hit the break-wall protecting the harbor next to the beach.
Another boat started taking on water, according to the Coast Guard.
Its unclear whether it too hit the break-wall.
Four people on board were rescued by another boat before it sank.
Master Captain Todd Brennan, with Boat Safe Chicago, was out there late Saturday night and early Sunday morning.
“I witnessed one, myself,” he said. “It was the result of the fog. I know they were just trying to make it to 31st Street. I spoke with them. The boat was there on the beach. They just said they couldn’t find the harbor and then they ran into the wall and then they basically just kind of freaked out, it sounds like, and everybody jumped out because they were kind of almost on the beach.”
He told WBBM they weren’t aware of the Chart-Plotter app that turns a smart phone into a marine GPS.
You can track your position in real time. You can find the mouth of a harbor in blinding fog.
Brennan says “if you’re a weekend warrior, you’re totally blind.”
He said, “even for me as a seasoned mariner I’ve been in fog all around the world and I still get unnerved when I’m in the middle of it and that’s with me with a chart-plotter, that’s with me with a radar and I know how to use all those things.”
He says boaters should learn to use the technology when conditions are good so they’re ready for bad conditions.
