Jacksonville boater still missing after vessel capsizes

17ft boat has NO business 15 miles off shore!!!!!!!!!

Do you really think you can swim 15 miles!!!???!!!?

Next time bring a RADIO so when it takes on water you call the coast guard BEFORE it sinks! DAHHHHHH

5 people on a 17 foot boat?

always file a boat plan or let someone know where you are going and when you will be back, also always try to stay with the boat as it is easier to see then a lone swimmer w/pfd

STAY WITH THE BOAT!!!!!

Your chances are always best to stay with the boat until it sinks and even then you should stick together in that spot.

Your right, a 17 foot boat with 4 guys 15 miles off...not smart.

How do you even consider leaving a floating boat in the middle of the night. Anything that floats is the place to stay in such an incident.

i fear for the final swimmer yet undected...

It never ceases to amaze me that people do such senseless things involving boats and open water. Everything these men did was a deliberate, bad decision. Previous posters have already mentioned that 5 men in a 17-ft boat is bad decision... That's number 1. Going so far offshore in an overloaded vessel is number two. No VHF radio (outside of cell tower reception) is number 3. Leaving the boat was the 4th and final, REALLY bad call. Of course, this was mitigated due to the fact that they, most likely didn't file a float plan with anyone who might miss them, thus affecting the rescue attempt, which they cleary set themselves up for the minute they casted off, in the first place!

Not to be a Monday-morning-Quarterback, but hey, cmon!... This was a totally avoidable tragedy. My prayers go out to the families of those involved for recovery, survival, and better common sense in the future.

I hope someone learns from the mistakes of others. I'm glad everything turned out well but I hope they learned from their mistakes.

If you think that there were alot of poor thinking going on maybe they should take lessons fro the rafters. I think thay were trying to get to Georgia. Remember wet foot/ dry foot????????

1 overloaded boat
5 idiots with no radio to call Coast Guard.
4 idiots that think they can swim to shore.

5 very lucky people that should never be let out on a boat again.

Wait I know why #5 stayed with the boat. Someone had to save the beer and stay with it. Beer and boating dont mix, just like drinking and driving.

I'm surprised they had PFDs in the boat!

I wonder how much money that rescued cost.

can you see land or tall buildings from 15 miles out?

I've seen 18 foot boats with an 8-person/1400 lb. load limit. How is 5 people on a 17 footer automatically overloaded?

YOung ron even though the vessel may be able to contain the woeght safely it does not have the freeboard to prevent wavws from coming in when loaded that heavily. Ya just got to use your head. That how the capt and his crew amnage to get such fresh fish back to port and into our stores come on in for a fish and more dinner and bring those retard kids and that slut wife of yours as well.

Ron wrote:

I've seen 18 foot boats with an 8-person/1400 lb. load limit. How is 5 people on a 17 footer automatically overloaded?

Go check out the new movie, Guardian. It is about big rescues at sea. Appropriate for this article.
I agree though, 5 guys in this small boat this far out? Doesn't add up. No wonder it took on water. Too much weight for that small boat to handle.
Really, go see the movie. It is very good.

Almost all the comments I've read here are right on. Even if they didn't intend to go 15 miles out, and drifted, they still started out too far.
Maybe they caught more fish than they counted on and exceeded the boat's limit. Thank god they had PFDs - too many of these stories end badly for lack of life jackets. I'm writing this one up on dailyboater.com .

foley and 4 young boys said he wa trying to get rid of some eveidence