Coast Guard finds 15-year-old alive atop capsized skiff near Savoonga

A U.S. Coast Guard aircrew found a 15-year-old boy alive on the hull of an overturned 18-foot skiff about 4 miles east of St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea at about 10:30 a.m. Monday, and a passing fishing vessel pulled him from the water hours later. The two relatives who had set out with him were recovered dead.

The survivor is Parker, 15, of Savoonga, according to his older brother Darren Toolie-Noongwook, who is speaking for the family. His brother Sidney drowned when the skiff flipped. A cousin, who the family asked not be named without his relatives' permission, died the following night. Toolie-Noongwook asked Anchorage television station KTUU to use only the first names of his brothers. The Coast Guard has not released any of the three names.

The skiff left Savoonga, on the northern coast of St. Lawrence Island, on Friday night to fish for halibut. It was due back at the island by about 3 a.m. Sunday, the Coast Guard said. Two brothers and a cousin were aboard.

How the search began

Alaska State Troopers were notified that the boat was overdue at about 2:30 p.m. Sunday, spokesman Austin McDaniel said. A local search and rescue team was active at that time. Once officials in Savoonga told troopers they could not respond because of the weather, the agency activated the Alaska Air National Guard's Rescue Coordination Center and the Coast Guard to mobilize higher level search and rescue resources, McDaniel said in an email to the Anchorage Daily News. The Coast Guard said troopers reached it at about 8:30 p.m. Sunday.

Weather and poor visibility kept the HC-130 Hercules based at Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak from flying to the area until Monday morning. Two HC-130s and two MH-60 Jayhawk helicopters launched from Kodiak. Arctic District officials said they coordinated Monday's search with the Alaska Rescue Coordination Center, the Alaska Air National Guard's 176th Wing units 211th Rescue Squadron and 212th Rescue Squadron from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, troopers and local authorities in Savoonga. Troopers and local agencies searched from the shore.

The Hercules crew spotted the teenager sitting on top of the capsized skiff and dropped a life raft and survival equipment. The plane was low on fuel and had to leave the area. "Before departing the scene to refuel, the HC-130 aircrew deployed a line of flares to guide the Northwest Explorer to the overturned vessel," the Coast Guard said. The agency first put the sighting at about 3 p.m. Monday and later corrected the time to about 10:30 a.m.

The vessel that turned around

The Northwest Explorer, a 162-foot fishing vessel, was returning from a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration survey when the Coast Guard's message arrived, captain Adam White said. He turned immediately for the coordinates and had his crew prepare supplies to keep the survivor warm. Thirteen people were aboard, six crew members and seven scientists, and all of them watched the water. "Longest 4 hours ever," White wrote in a message Tuesday after docking in Nome.

The overturned boat came into view less than a half-mile off the starboard bow. The crew picked out the teenager waving through binoculars and blasted the ship's horn to give him some hope that help was coming. He was about 8 miles from his last known position and could not reach the rafts floating near him, White said. Video of the rescue shows a crew member shouting "Stay on your boat!" and the boy, kneeling on the hull, giving a thumbs-up before looking down.

He caught a heaving line thrown from the deck and held on while the crew reeled him in. White said the boy was moderately hypothermic. The crew put him on a mattress under warm blankets that were cycled continually through the ship's dryers, added a few warming packs, and kept a log that showed his body temperature slowly rising.

What the teen told the crew

The teenager told White that the three had been fishing for halibut when the skiff capsized and that he had stayed on the boat for several days. His brother, he said, was still under the hull. His cousin had slipped into the water the night before. The crew recovered the brother's body first and then, with help from the Coast Guard, the cousin's. All three were brought into port at Nome on Tuesday.

The family works in commercial fishing, which requires them to stay out on the water for days at a time, Toolie-Noongwook told NBC News, and the crew was exhausted when a fishing line caught in the boat's motor. "Once the motor got caught in the fishing line, they tried to untangle it, but they couldn't because of how bad it was tangled," he said, recounting what Parker told the family. "So they were just sitting, and then later on at the end of the night, the weather got bad and the boat flipped."

• A fishing line fouled the skiff's motor and the crew could not clear it.
• The weather worsened and the boat flipped, which the family puts at about 8:03 p.m. Friday.
• Sidney, carrying a life jacket to Parker, was caught in the lines and pulled under.
• Parker and the cousin climbed onto the hull and spent the first night there together.
• The cousin panicked the next night, jumped in and drowned after five to six feet, the family said.

Parker was alone on the hull after that. Toolie-Noongwook said his brother felt safe because he believed Sidney was watching over him. "He was sitting on his knees, just praying the whole time," he said. Waves hit the boy through the night, and the family said afterward that he had kept believing he would be found.

No active Coast Guard investigation

No federal inquiry into the capsizing is under way. "At this time, there is no active Coast Guard investigation, and we cannot speculate on the cause or the exact time of the incident," Petty Officer Nathan Bishop said in an email to the Anchorage Daily News, which reported that a Coast Guard spokesman would not provide specifics about what may have caused the skiff to overturn.

The Coast Guard ended its search Monday. "Our hearts go out to the families, friends, and communities affected by the tragic loss of these two mariners," Rear Adm. Bob Little, commander of the Arctic District, said in a statement. He thanked the Northwest Explorer and the federal, state and village responders who took part.

What the Coast Guard would not say

The Coast Guard has not given a time for the capsizing. The 8:03 p.m. figure for Friday night comes from the family, who put the flip at the moment Sidney drowned; villages along the coast later fired guns into the ocean at that minute.

Villages fire guns into the ocean

Guns were fired into the ocean at 8:03 p.m. in Savoonga, Gambell, Nome, Shishmaref, Teller, Wales and Nunam Iqua to honor the two who died, KTUU reported. That is the time the family gives for the moment the skiff flipped. Toolie-Noongwook said one of his older brothers decided to shoot into the water, and other villages along the coast quickly said they would join.

White said the wait felt long to everyone aboard and that the mood broke when the boy appeared. "When he finally came into view, it was elation from everybody," he told NBC News. "Everybody cheered."

That is one remarkably tough kid, is all I can say.

White met Parker's family after the ship docked and described the meeting as overwhelming. "We gave each other a really long hug, and they just, they had a lot of joy," he told NBC News. The rescue and the recovery were bittersweet for the crew members and scientists aboard, he told the Anchorage Daily News.

Parker is recovering at home in Savoonga, his brother said. He had gone out on the boat to earn money to get his hair permed. "He was like, 'I'm excited to get my perm now, mom,'" Toolie-Noongwook said, speaking from Savoonga over Zoom.

Counselors headed for Savoonga

Behavioral health resources are being mobilized across the region, KNOM reported. The Bering Strait School District plans to send a counselor from Gambell to Savoonga and is coordinating with Norton Sound Health Corporation's Liitfik Behavioral Health Services team. Two behavioral health aides and one clinical associate are already on site, said Reba Lean, a spokesperson for Norton Sound Health Corporation, who said weather will be a factor in getting employees to the island. Staff from Nome will travel to the community when possible.

Savoonga is a Siberian Yupik village of about 800 people on the northern coast of St. Lawrence Island, which sits just over 160 miles west of Nome and within about 40 miles of Russia. Officials have not publicly identified the two who died or the survivor.