ST. JOHN’S, N.L. – The bodies of two fishermen were recovered from waters off eastern Newfoundland, while crews continued a grim search from the air and sea for two more men who were on board the boat.
Conditions were calm under blue skies as they went about their work in a zodiac and police boat as a coast guard ship could be seen farther offshore.
Ron Ellsworth, deputy mayor of St. John’s, said the deaths will have a deep ripple effect in the small enclave of Shea Heights where the men were from.
“Everybody knows everybody and it will be devastating for the community,” he said.
Friends of the fishermen said three generations of the same family were on the boat.
RCMP Staff Sgt. Boyd Merrill said Wednesday that they received a report Tuesday night of an overturned seven-metre boat that was overdue in its return to St. John’s Harbour.
He said several assets were deployed to the area Tuesday, with crews finding the remains of two men later that night after they believe the boat overturned somewhere off Cape Spear.
“They located the remains of two individuals off the coastline,” he said. “The four men are believed to be from the St. John’s area…and are believed to have known each other very well.”
He said the men’s bodies were brought into port and turned over to the medical examiner to be identified and to determine the cause of death.
One local man who knows one of the missing men, but did not wish to be named, said one of them had a cod licence. They were apparently out checking nets Tuesday in the area between Cape Spear and the Narrows leading into St. John’s.
“Your heart breaks for the families,” said a woman watching from shore who did not wish to be identified.
“It’s devastating.”
She went to school in Shea Heights and knows relatives of the men.
“It’s a close community and I’m sure they’ll rally around the family at this time.”
The Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre said a Cormorant Helicopter, Hercules plane, two coast guard vessels and several local fishing vessels had all been involved in the effort to find the boat when they were notified of the missing vessel.
Lt. Len Hickey said the boat was discovered Wednesday near the men’s fishing nets, but he wasn’t able to provide an exact location.
He said overnight weather conditions and poor visibility forced aircraft to temporarily return to base, but they planned to resume the search as local weather conditions improved.
Merrill said there were high winds Tuesday, possibly making it difficult for boats travelling in the area outside the harbour.
“It was windy and as such the waves and wave conditions would have been much more difficult to manoeuvre a boat in,” he said.
Dozens of people had gathered at the coast guard’s Southside base and at Fort Amherst to await news on the search.
The Transportation Safety Board was sending a team of investigators to the scene on Wednesday.
In a report last month into three crab fishing deaths in 2015 in Placentia Bay, the TSB said there were 189 deaths involving commercial fishing vessels between 2000 and 2015 in Canada, 31 of them in Newfoundland and Labrador alone.
“The number of accidents involving loss of life on fishing vessels remains too high,” the report said.
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