It was a daring rescue at sea nearly 300 miles northeast of Hilo under stormy conditions. Three sailors plucked from the ocean...after their disabled boat capsized.
The three survivors from Canada walked off the container ship that plucked them out of the Pacific Ocean early Thursday morning, grateful and relieved.
"I knew making a crossing like that I'd probably see something but I didn't think it would be as bad as it was," said Mitch James, one of the rescued men. "We're all grateful to be here."
Mitch James, his brother Brad and Brad's son West were sailing from Mexico to Hawaii, when the mast of their 38-foot boat, the Liahona, broke and the engine died. The Horizon Lines container ship "Reliance" was sent to rescue them because it was the closest ship to their location. By then there were 25 foot waves and winds gusting more than 60 miles per hour.
"I had to put a 900-foot ship close enough to throw a line to these three fellows without running them over, without crushing them, without killing them," said James Kelleher, the captain of the Horizon Reliance.
The rough seas caused the ship to collide with the sailboat which then started to sink. Luckily, they had their lifejackets on with strobe lights. West's dad also did a smart thing to keep them from drifting apart.
"He strapped a belt to one of the ropes on the life preserver and that kept me on to the life preserver, it was really scary," said West James, the 9 year-old survivor.
Mitch was rescued first. But the father and son were floating in the water for another hour and a half. As if the miserable conditions weren't enough, West was also worried about sharks.
"And I was just so freaked out that I was gonna lose my dad or that I was gonna bleed to death because of one of those," West James said.
Eventually though, everybody made it aboard the massive ship safely, but suffering from mild hypothermia.
"It was just like a gauntlet of happiness, everyone was just, there was tons of people there and it was all these grown men and everyone, not everyone but most of us had tears in our eyes," expressed Brad James.
