On the way in from fishing, we came across this small boat about 4 miles from Key West that had broken loose from its mooring. It was drifting southwest from Key West. This wasn’t a fancy boat. It looked like someone’s liveaboard. If so, they were not living in “high style”. But I’m sure it was home and better than living on the street. The cabin was all closed up, so I laid on my air horn just in case someone was inside and asleep, (it happens). My airhorn is pretty loud, if anyone was inside, it would have woken them up.
Just because it was adrift, I had no right to board the boat, and unfortunately, I could not take it undertow. Once you put a line on a vessel in a situation like this, you are responsible for it. Sadly, I could not afford to take a chance with that. All I could do was call the USCG and stayed on the scene until they arrived. Once they were there, I continued on to Key West.
it was my hope that the Coast Guard would tow it back to Key West. I know some of the commercial salvors in town and to them, a boat like that is not worth towing. they are in it for the money and from the looks of the boat, the owner didn’t have much. Sad, but I don’t blame them. Charter boat Captains don’t work for free either.
The next day on the radio I heard another boat found it still adrift about 20 miles Southwest of Key West the next day. I never heard anything else about it. I have no idea who the owner is or was but I feel bad for whoever it was. No doubt it was a rude surprise when they came back to their boat only to find it gone. There is a lesson in this. Just because you have been securely anchored doesn’t mean you should ignore your ground tackle. If you are anchored out, you have to check it every once and a while. The ocean wears on EVERYTHING. A quick dive a few days earlier and he might still have his boat