A WINTER HOLIDAY on an island off Cork turned to disaster when a small boat capsized off the coast in the early hours of Friday morning.
A 62-year-old Swiss tourist died when the 5m (16ft) punt in which he was travelling with nine other men and their luggage, capsised in a heavy swell and winds gusting up to 100km/h (62mph).
The boat, which was also packed with luggage, was heading to Coney Island, a privately-owned island less than half a mile off the Cork coast. None of the men were wearing life jackets, it seems and eight of the nine survivors spent a number of hours clinging to their boat before they were swept ashore by the tide.
Michael
O'Regan of the Goleen Coast Guard said the fact that
nine of the 10 men managed to survive the tragedy. was "a miracle"
"As far as we could see nobody was wearing a life jacket. I did not see life jackets anyway," he added.
The man who died had arrived in Ireland the night before along with eight friends to stay at a holiday home on Coney Island, owned by Irishman Michael McGill.
All aged between 55 and 62, the group left Colla Pier near Schull in west Cork shortly after the pubs closed at 11.30pm on Thursday. The boat's engine failed at Long Island Sound and the boat capsized shortly after 1am.
It took until sometime after 2am for the alarm to be raised when one of the 10 men managed to swim ashore to nearby Long Island, which only has a few residents. The other survivors were washed ashore to Long Island by 4am. The man who died was found on the beach by members of the Baltimore RNLI lifeboat crew, w called to the scene along with lifeboats from Baltimore and Castletownbere.
Eight survivors made their way to a vacant house on Long Island not knowing a ninth member of their party had already raised the alarm and were relieved to be discovered in the vacant house.
The survivors were then were taken to Bantry General Hospital for treatment and later discharged after being treated for shock.
Kieran Cotter, coxswain of the All Weather Baltimore Lifeboat, said the men were deeply shocked when they were found in the vacant house.
"They were very cold," he said. "It was very wet and windy. They were extremely lucky they held on to the boat."
He did not understand how nine of the men survived in the water, which was about 10 degrees.
He also said he did not know whether the men had life jackets as they had removed their wet clothes before they were found.
"I don't know about life jackets, I did not see any," he said.
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