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June 28, 2007

Boat brought up from ocean floor

Dan Atkinson

NEWBURYPORT — Hook “N” Up made her final voyage yesterday, with the assistance of divers, towboats and a half-dozen inflatable bags.

The yacht, which caught fire and sank off Plum Island Wednesday, was salvaged from the ocean floor yesterday afternoon because of concerns about an incoming storm, said Mike Goodridge, who owns the local TowBoat U.S. franchise.

“There might have been problems with stuff washing up on the beach with the storm going on,” Goodridge said.

The 33-foot 1974 Egg Harbor cruiser, captained by Seabrook native William Lyon, caught fire for unknown reasons off the ocean side of Plum Island Wednesday afternoon. Lyon was rescued by a passing boater and uninjured. However, the boat was engulfed in flames and severely damaged.

Newburyport Harbormaster Ralph Steele said his assistant responded to the Hook “N” Up immediately after hearing a distress signal, but the boat was too dangerous to approach.

“My guys fortunately knew not to go over there,” Steele said. “It was a gas-driven boat; it could’ve exploded.”

Goodridge also responded to the call and was able to put out the fire with his water pump. His crew then tried to use the pump to bail out the boat, but the fire had eaten away a large part of the rear end, and more water was coming in than going out. Goodridge pulled his equipment, and Hook “N” Up sank to the bottom, he said.

After hearing warnings of the approaching storm yesterday, Goodridge and Lyon’s insurance company decided to salvage the boat even though the tide was not at an optimal level.

To bring up Hook “N” Up, Goodridge and another employee dived 30 feet to the bottom and tied large inflatable bags to the boat. Another person on Goodridge’s boat then pumped up the bags, which lifted it to water level, Goodridge said.

When the boat was salvaged, Goodridge pumped the water out and then added even more bags. Because of the huge chunk burned out of the rear port side, Goodridge didn’t want to risk the boat taking on water as they were bringing it in.

“We didn’t want to lose it, to come all that way and have it sink again,” Goodridge said.

From there, they had a long trip ahead of them. They left after 10 a.m. and finished the salvage by 1 p.m., but the two towboats had to go against the tide to get back to the Merrimack, and the larger boat was dragging Hook “N” Up. If they had been with the tide, Goodridge estimated the journey would have gone twice as fast, but boats were going three knots over the five miles back to the river, and it was 4 p.m. by the time they pulled up to Cashman Park.

Dozens of people watched as the towboaters maneuvered Hook “N” Up onto a large trailer, with people snapping photos of the charred fiberglass exterior and wood interior. The deck had burned down clear to the hull, and though the boat had spent a day underwater, the smell of burned wood was palpable.

Goodridge will store the boat until an insurance investigator examines the cause of the fire.

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