A 50-year-old man washed ashore on the Frisco beach just an hour or so after he was reported missing from a fishing boat off Hatteras Island on Monday, Nov. 14.
The man was on board the commercial fishing vessel, the Lady Kimberly out of Beaufort, when he fell overboard while holding a net, according to Petty Officer Third Class and Public Affairs Specialist Corinne Silnicki of the U.S. Coast Guard.
The Coast Guard received the call from the Lady Kimberly at around noon and was the lead agency responding to the incident, although three other commercial fishing vessels that were in the area joined in the search of the waters off of Hatteras as well. At the time of the incident, the winds were blowing southwest at 25 knots, and the seas were an average of 5 feet high.
According to Boone Vandzura, Cape Hatteras National Seashore’s Chief Ranger, a surf fisherman along the beach in Frisco close to the Billy Mitchell Airport called Dare Central at around 1:08 p.m. to report that a body was washing ashore about 200 yards west of Ramp 49. The National Park Service and the Hatteras Island Rescue Squad responded to the scene. The body was identified as the missing man, and was transferred off the beach by the Rescue Squad at around 2 p.m.
