Posted on 04/09/2014 3:32:32 PM PDT by SilvieWaldorfMD
(Reuters) - A family of four rescued from their sailboat after their infant daughter became seriously ill at sea returned safely to San Diego on Wednesday aboard a U.S. warship that picked them up in the Pacific over the weekend, a Navy spokeswoman said.
The parents, Eric and Charlotte Kaufman, and their two daughters, 3-year-old Cora and 1-year-old Lyra, left the Navy frigate Vandegrift after the ship arrived in port around 10 a.m. local time and proceeded to their family doctor, according to Lieutenant Lenaya Rotklein of the Third Fleet.
Rotklein declined to give any further information about the arrival of the Kaufmans at Naval Air Station North Island on San Diego Bay except to say all four family members were "stable when they departed" and were met at the port by relatives.
The family was two weeks into a planned around-the-world cruise on their 36-foot (11-metre) sloop when Lyra developed a fever and rash, prompting her parents to send a distress call to the Coast Guard by satellite phone last Thursday.
In addition to the child falling ill, the family reported that their boat was taking on water whenever they tried to start the vessel's engine, the Coast Guard said.
A four-man team from the California Air National Guard's 129th Rescue Wing was dispatched by military plane to the scene, about 1,000 miles (1,600 km) out in the Pacific off Mexico, to render medical assistance.
(Excerpt) Read more at in.reuters.com ...
Send them a bill .
It leaked when they ran the engine eh? Sounds like the stuffing box needed to be repacked, which ain’t exactly rocket science.
Thanks. I had a feeling that would be the consensus :-)
In an earlier story about them, they insisted that their boat was in great shape and that their daughter was cleared to travel after “recovering” from her illness.
I think 33+ has worked well for many.
Agree! If a bridge out here has water over it during/after a rain and you drive your truck into it and get swept away-if you survive and the county has to rescue you, you are given the bill from hell, which you will pay one way or another...
I going to guess that they were experienced sailors, rather than wannabees-I don’t think I would want to go there unless I were Thor Hyerdahl-was that the name of that guy who proved the Polynesians did it?
I’m not one to generally defend gross stupidity, and I have to assume that anyone who is prepared enough to have a sat phone is likely prepared enough with basic sailcraft and knowledge of their boat.
But all the dumping on this family... I’m aghast at how much this ended up costing the taxpayers, and truly wonder why they get to walk away scott-free, but when I compare it to a similar family living in taxpayer paid housing, both adults not working, food stamps, WIC, free health care, etc, etc, etc, the overall ‘costs’ kinda balance out in my book.
While I’d never attempt such a thing (and really can’t imagine two toddlers on a boat for more than a few hours...), least they’re not sitting in government housing sucking at the public teet. Oh, wait, their sailboat is sunk... Maybe that’s just where they are going.
I think he only proved that they could have.
Most evidence apparently indicates that the Polynesians did not start on the West coast of South America.
Yup.
Thanks-I couldn’t remember exactly what he did, but he must have been a good sailor. I think the prevailing theory is that the Polynesians came to S. America from someplace else, too.
I’m with those who think people could have gone just about anywhere with a boat during much of the last ice age, because with the lower sea levels, they would have only been out of sight of land for brief periods. Which is what it sounds like the family in the article should have done-stay in sight of land...
Back in the 1990s, when Anoreth and Bill were babies, we would all recite “Home for a Bunny,” “Sheep in a Jeep,” and “Who are Baby’s Friends?” during car trips. Looking back, I wonder how we survived. Cranking up the country music, perhaps.
I remember going on a motorboat trip on Lake Tenkiller in Oklahoma with those two. Bill (used to be Billy) was only about 18 months then. Terrifying. Little kids want to climb off things, and they usually can’t swim.
Anoreth's Coast Guard cutter went to Borneo, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand ...
Even in these declining-empire days, American jurisdiction goes as far as we're willing to push it. We haz teh teknolojies.
We may be a bunch of drunk suburban goofballs, but we know better than taking toddlers on a round-the-world boat trip. Shoot, we know better than taking toddlers to Walmart, if we can possibly avoid it.
“It’s a good thing the US Navy sank their sailboat... otherwise, these morons would’ve tried to patch it up again and try sailing across the Pacific Ocean again...”
It wouldn’t bother me if they try again,I just hope they get to pay the full cost of the rescue effort
Those poor children.
Yep, one of my emergency room visits was for a kid’s fall out of tree that resulted in a nasty gash that took stitches. I found out years later the same kid liked to climb up on our roof from a second story balcony and hang out up there. Put a stop to that when she tried to get the younger kids involved.
I’m gonna say what everyone’s thinking but too gutless to. SMASH them financially. Destroy them. Obliterate them. Send them a bill so big and punishing they BEG the state to take their children rather than let them starve.
Then refuse them. Zero assistance. ZERO!
Until ppl are utterly ruined, absolutely destroyed to the point their own children hate them for ruining their lives and their families turn on them, this stupid crap will go on. Take every stinking dime that might cross their hands until they’re living in a cardboard box and eating out of trash cans at McDonalds, and then confiscate the cardboard box too.
Nothing short of absolute brutality is going to get the point across.
OTOH, Gradient is the Elixir of Youth.
Idiot parents should be brought up on child endangerment charges, who brings thier kids on a sail boat going round the world on an ocean? The perfect storm comes to mind
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