Katharina Buczek
A father-son duo set out to catch lobsters in Boston Harbor one Wednesday afternoon when tragedy stuck. Lobster traps caught and killed their boat’s engine before the vessel began to drift into the rocks.
Then, their twenty-eight-foot boat, known as “Glory Days,” began to rapidly take on water and sink within just a few minutes.
This left the pair clutching a cooler and lifebuoy about one hundred yards off of the coast of Graves Light until Boston Police Harbor Unit officers came to the rescue.
While approaching the scene, officers Garret Boyle and Stephen Merrick could only see a tiny portion of the boat’s bow still above water. Then, they saw the two men clinging to a blue cooler for life.
“They looked nervous; you could see fear on their faces. They looked very tired and weak– they were really struggling to keep their head above the water,” Merrick said.
Thankfully, the police boat was equipped with a feature that allowed its bow to lower. So, officers were able to drop the platform into the water so the two men could crawl on it.
“We are so weak. I can’t even move. Help him up, please,” the son said to officers, whose statement was captured on body cam footage.
The two officers had been on patrol about eight minutes away when they received the 911 call. But, they arrived in the nick of time and have since said the two men got very lucky.
Facebook; pictured above are the officers with the Boston Police Department who jumped in to rescue the dad and his son
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