Man found dead aboard sailboat in NJ

[GeorgeH]

I know a few sailors who would wouldn't mind this for an ending.

The Associated Press
Oct 31, 2014 10:28 AM EDT


SANDY HOOK, N.J. (AP) - State Police are awaiting autopsy results after a New York man was found dead aboard a sailboat that ran aground on a New Jersey beach.

State Police Capt. Stephen Jones says witnesses observed the 29-foot vessel drifting before it came ashore on a beach at Gateway National Recreation Area at Sandy Hook on Thursday.

The man aboard the vessel was pronounced dead at the scene.

The vessel is registered to a 73-year-old Brooklyn, New York, resident. Jones says authorities are not releasing his name because he may have relatives overseas.

Jones says nothing suspicious was observed on the vessel.

[Zeida]

Something really serious to consider. This appeals to me.

[tjr818]

In a way it is sad, but that is how I would like to spend my final moments. Perhaps not alone, definitely not at such an early age.

God speed unknown sailor.

[David Morton]

Let's all just hope he had a smile on his face.

David

[joemerchant]

There was a liveaboard many years ago in our marina. I won't say where as it may give it away and don't want to salt old wounds.

It was determined he was too old and unhealthy to continue living aboard and they decided it was time to move him to a home that has full time care. He asked to go back to the boat and pack some personal things himself at which point he took his own life.

We were all very sad for him and his family, but each and every one of us understood.

He was one of a few old salts that I learned a lot from growing up on the docks. I don't agree with him and his decision to go that way, and wish he would have accepted more from his fellow dock mates who never felt burdened by him. Personally, I felt as a 20 year old that he still had a lot to teach us. But as I get older, the more I understand...

[sfreihofer]

Zeida, I share your sentiment. Not a bad way to go.

[joemerchant]

If you ever get a chance, this is a great blog to read. Don't read the first page until last. http://blamebuffett.blogspot.com/

[adamganz]

I read this original post with some alarm as I sail near sandy hook regularly and, like the deceased sailor, also call Brooklyn home. I didn't know the man but have been trying to find out more about the circumstances and who he was.

He was identified as Victor Turzhavsky. He was 73. His death at Sandy Hook appears to have been from natural causes.

It was also reported that he had a previous incident with the coast guard 10 years ago, which I've copied below. It's a good read.

-----

The Coast Guard rescues two Russian sailors from the same 50-foot
ketch in separate incidents (from 2005)

The first Coast Guard rescue helicopter — there would later be another
in this strange tale — was responding to an unidentified EPIRB signal
at 10 a.m. when it spotted the yacht Anabel motoring north, 75 miles
off Cape Hatteras, N.C., and with no visual signs of distress.

The weather was undesirable, and the boat was aimed in an
unconventional direction for a winter cruise. It was Feb. 10, and
winds were gale force, seas 10 to 11 feet. But Anabel — a 50-foot
ketch with crisp white topsides, blue trim and a fully enclosed aft
cockpit — was handling the head seas with its sails furled and motor
driving it at about 5 knots.

No one seemed to be in danger. Still, as his Jayhawk helicopter
hovered near Anabel, Coast Guard pilot Lt. Curtis Brown consulted with
his crew about their next step. Anabel wasn’t responding to calls on
the VHF, though the crew could see two men and a dog on board. Then
one of the men was seen donning a life vest. When he had gathered some
belongings, the man stepped to Anabel’s rail and leapt into the water.
The dog, a white pit bull, followed him.

Thus began a series of events that triggered Coast Guard concerns
about homeland security, and concluded several days later with a
second rescue hundreds of miles north in a still-raw ocean. The
following account was compiled from interviews with Coast Guard
officials in Virginia, New York and Massachusetts.

Brown and co-pilot Lt. J.G. Audie Andry, seeing the man and dog hit
the water, switched to rescue mode. Brown lowered the helicopter to
within 15 feet of the heaving seas, and rescue swimmer Petty Officer
Joel Sayers, already in his gear, leapt from the door as Petty Officer
3rd Class Thomas Romero prepared the hoist. Within two minutes the
rescue basket was on board the helicopter, carrying a drenched
Russian, 23-year-old Roman Bogdanov, and the dog, Lilly. The rescuers
found Bogdanov cold but uninjured. The dog, no doubt equally cold, sat
quietly at the rear of the cabin. As they tried to warm Bogdanov,
crewmembers began asking questions.

Bogdanov told them Anabel’s captain was another Russian, Victor
Turzhavsky, 63, who like Bogdanov lived in Brooklyn, N.Y. Their boat
had been taking on water — about a half-foot every two hours — and an
electric bilge pump was handling it. But the radio apparently was
dead, and Bogdanov explained that he had triggered the EPIRB because
he didn’t like some of the skipper’s decisions.

The chopper next lowered a hand-held radio to Turzhavsky, who then
indicated that the Coast Guard should leave. Unable to persuade the
skipper to communicate, and with their fuel supply running low, the
chopper crew headed back to North Carolina.

Meanwhile in Newport, Va., Lt. Cmdr. Jeffrey Randall had put a Coast
Guard cutter on standby to intercept Anabel. Randall, branch chief of
the 5th District’s law enforcement division, had heard what was going
on offshore. In an era of dirty bombs and other unconventional enemy
threats, he was concerned.

He says he wondered why somebody would just jump off a vessel into the
water. “That’s kind of out of the norm,” says Randall. “He [the
skipper] wouldn’t answer the radio. He was waving us away, saying I
don’t want you, get away. That tells us that maybe we need to look
into this a little closer.”

Randall had a background check run on Turzhavsky and found only that
he was a licensed captain. They checked out the agent for the boat,
Vinova Meyler, who represented the new owner of Anabel, which had
recently been sold. They found nothing suspicious.

The crew was on the cutter with engines running, “Waiting for us to
hit the ‘go’ button,” Randall says. But it would have taken too long
for the cutter to reach Anabel, he says, and seas were too rough to
conduct a boarding. “You’re talking about Cape Hatteras with a
northeast wind,” he says. “It’s an ugly place to be.”

Having found nothing in the skipper or agent’s backgrounds to cause
alarm, Randall kept the cutter in port but passed his information
along to the next Coast Guard district up the coast.

Anabel’s EPIRB kept signaling for four more days, a period during
which Turzhavsky radioed for a weather report but then refused to
communicate with the Coast Guard. And then all contact with Anabel
ceased … for four days.

Lt. Jason Dorval, commander of a Jayhawk helicopter stationed on Cape
Cod, Mass., had been in the air for about an hour Feb. 18 when he got
a call at 1:30 p.m. to return to the base and refuel. Anabel had
issued a mayday from 150 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard.

As Dorval flew south, he had to dodge snow squalls blowing over a sea
whipped by a 30-knot northwest wind into 10- to 15-foot waves. The
command center had told Dorval that the skipper spoke only Russian.
Dorval asked them to relay a message to Turzhavsky that he would
probably have to jump in the water.

It would be about 75 minutes before Dorval and his co-pilot, Lt. Sean
Kruger, first saw Anabel. The boat was sailing northeast at about 4
knots under a fully reefed mainsail. “He would be hard pressed to hit
land [even] up in Nova Scotia,” Dorval says. In the mayday,
intercepted by the Coast Guard in New York, Turzhavsky had reported
that his engine had quit, his rudder was stuck, and he was taking on
water. From the helicopter Dorval saw that the sailboat’s mizzenmast
was unsupported, its shrouds slack and wrapping about it.

With the Jayhawk hovering at about 75 feet, rescue swimmer John
Houlberg clipped onto the chopper’s cable, and Aviation Mechanic 1st
Class Bill Cameron lowered him beside Anabel. Turzhavsky was standing
at the rail when Houlberg motioned for him to jump. With a scream, the
Russian leapt into the sea, clad in jeans, a sweatshirt, winter jacket
and a PWC life vest.

Turzhavsky was hoisted aboard, bundled into a “thermal recovery
capsule” and a sleeping bag, and flown to an airport on eastern Long
Island, N.Y., as Houlberg and Cameron unsuccessfully attempted to
communicate with him.

When the chopper crew left the scene, Anabel was sailing on her own
toward open ocean. Given the conditions of the sea and the boat,
Dorval assumes the boat would have sank.

The last the Coast Guard saw of Turzhavsky was when an unidentified
ambulance pulled up to the chopper at Republic Airport in East
Farmingdale, N.Y., and took him away. The agency was unable to report
on his condition. Randall says that while Turzhavsky may have violated
United States law that prohibits non-citizens from skippering
U.S.-documented vessels in national waters, no charges had been filed
in the case

[Joe Myerson]

Adam,
Fascinating. Thanks for posting this.
--Joe

[Neil Gordon]

The Coast Guard rescue team gets extra credit... I can't imagine being in a rescue helicopter with a disoriented pit bull.

I didn't realize there were rules about foreign nationals skippering US documented vessels.