34 presumed dead as search ends for survivors in boat fire
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — No one likely escaped the flames that tore through a boat packed with scuba divers, with all 34 people sleeping below deck presumed dead during a Labor Day weekend expedition off the Southern California coast, authorities said Tuesday as they called off the search for survivors.
Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown said no one has been found alive after fire engulfed the dive boat early Monday. Flames blocked an escape hatch and a stairwell leading to the sleeping area crowded with passengers on a recreational scuba diving trip.
Santa Barbara County Fire Chief Mark Hartwig told reporters that the victims’ relatives “will rely on us to do everything in our power to find out happened aboard that vessel in the last moments of these family members’ lives. That’s our commitment.”
Five crew members sleeping on the top deck were able to escape by jumping off and taking a small boat to safety.
The fire that engulfed the Conception likely killed all 33 passengers and one crew member who was below deck, the sheriff said. Investigators have not determined how the fire erupted.
The bodies of 20 victims have been recovered, and divers have seen other bodies in the sunken wreckage, the sheriff said. Authorities are trying to stabilize the boat that sank in about 60 feet of water so divers can recover those remains.
Most need to be identified by DNA analysis and officials are collecting samples from family members, Brown said.
One passenger, marine biologist Kristy Finstad, 41, was identified in a Facebook post by her brother, Brett Harmeling, of Houston.
“Please pray for my sister Kristy!! She was leading a dive trip on this boat,” Harmeling wrote.
The sheriff says the majority of the victims appear to have been from Northern California.
The boat had departed Santa Barbara Harbor on Saturday and the fire broke out about 3 a.m. Monday while it was anchored off Santa Cruz Island, about 90 miles west of Los Angeles. The crew appeared to quickly call for help.
“The call was garbled, it was not that clear, but we were able to get some information out of it to send vessels,” Coast Guard Petty Officer Mark Barney said.
The 75-foot Conception was on a three-day excursion to the isles that form Channel Islands National Park in the Pacific Ocean west of Los Angeles.
The Conception, based in Santa Barbara Harbor on the mainland, was owned by Santa Barbara-based Truth Aquatics, founded in 1974. A memorial outside Truth Aquatics in the Santa Barbara Harbor grew Tuesday as mourners came to pay their respects.
Dave Reid, who runs an underwater camera manufacturing business with his wife, Terry Schuller, has traveled on the Conception and two other boats in Truth Aquatics’ fleet, and said he considered all three among the best and safest.
“When you see the boats they are always immaculate,” he said. “I wouldn’t hesitate at all to go on one again. Of all the boat companies, that would be one of the ones I wouldn’t think this would happen to.”