The United States Coast Guard is now heading up the investigation into how a boat capsized on the Hudson River leading to the death of two people.
News 12 New Jersey spoke with a boat captain who works on the Hudson River every day. Capt. Paul Dauriac says that he has warned the Coast Guard for years that an accident like the one that occurred on Tuesday was inevitable.
“I have been very vocal with the Coast Guard for five years about what was going on in New York Harbor,” Dauriac says.
Dauriac owns and operates four charter boats within his company SailAwayNewYork.com. He says that there are too many small, so-called “bareboat charters” that are operating unchecked by the Coast Guard on the river. He says that it can be dangerous for boat traffic.
“We see them. You’ve got 10 people on a boat that’s 26 feet long. It defies logic,” Dauriac says.
The Coast Guard says that there were 12 people onboard a 24-foot boat that capsized around 3 p.m. Tuesday.
Lindelia Vazquez, 47, and Julian Vazquez, 7, became trapped under the boat and died. It has brought about questions of if there were too many people on the boat. The victims were with 10 other relatives at the time.
Coincidentally, the Coast Guard issued a release about boating safety on Wednesday, stating, “Overloading can cause the boat to ride lower in the water, reduce the vessel’s stability and greatly increase the chance of capsizing.”
The release also suggests that people “be on the lookout for illegal charters.” The agency also says that any vessel carrying six or more passengers, “must have a valid Coast Guard Certificate of Inspection.”
The Coast Guard has not yet named the charter, or the captain involved in the crash and did not say if the boat has Coast Guard credentials.