The Coast Guard successfully rescued three fishermen in distress 72 nautical miles southeast of Montauk on Sunday evening after the crew abandoned its 44-foot commercial fishing vessel, the Nite Nurse, when it started taking on water and sinking.
Around 9:30 p.m., according to a press release, a radio call came in for Coast Guard Sector Long Island Sound watchstanders. The Coast Guard then issued an urgent marine information broadcast and dispatched a Coast Guard Air Station Cape Cod MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter crew, a HC-144 Ocean Sentry airplane crew, and the Coast Guard Cutter Kingfisher.
Meanwhile, the three crew members from the Nite Nurse were told to put on life jackets and make sure they had an emergency position-indicating radio beacon with them before getting into their life raft.
The Coast Guard reported that the helicopter crew was able to locate the life raft and hoist the fishermen into the helicopter. Video footage from the save shows a diver being lowered down in a metal basket; one by one, he retrieves each crew member and deposits him in the basket, to be lifted up to the helicopter in shifts.
The diver exited the water last by hitching his wetsuit to a wire. The Coast Guard said the fishermen were transported to Coast Guard Air Station Cape Cod, where emergency medical responders were waiting.
"This case was a success because these mariners did everything professional mariners should do to be found," Lt. Banning Lobmeyer, the HC-144 Ocean Sentry pilot who flew during the rescue mission, said in a statement. "They reported the problem early, which led to a quicker response time from our crews. They stayed with their boat as long as possible before getting into their life raft, took and used flares and an EPIRB, and they were dressed appropriately in survival suits."