Researchers, FSU students help save stranded boater

A group of researchers, including two Florida State University students, helped save an imperiled boater stranded in rough waters Saturday night.

Brent Summers, Isaiah Rivera and four other students were returning to shore about 9 p.m. when the U.S. Coast Guard notified them that three men were stranded in the water near Egmont Key and separated from their boat, according to the Florida Institute of Oceanography (FIO).

Summers and Rivera were part of a student group at FIO, a statewide collaborative research group hosted at the University of South Florida College of Marine Science. The two were joined by four other students and seven crew members aboard the Weatherbird II research vessel when they got the call.

The Coast Guard crew rescued two of the men, while the students on the Weatherbird sailed two miles to try to find the other man.

They searched for about an hour in the dark, and even turned off parts of the boat to listen for screams. The students spread throughout the boat to look for him. Eventually, a student from USF spotted him in the water.

"All I saw was the guy in the water," Summer said, "and all I saw was his head and his arm because the waves were hitting him."

Crews then tossed him a flotation device and he was brought on board. He was dehydrated and said he could have survived just a few more minutes in the water. The three men then had an emotional reunion, according to FIO.

"At first we were all kind of shocked that we actually found him," added Summers, an environmental science major.

Angie Knapp, a professor in FSU's Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science department, was also on board during the rescue. However, she and other top researchers slept through the ordeal, after having worked for 24 hours straight.

"This is an exceptionally rare circumstance," she said. "We're extremely proud of the students and just really grateful we could help rescue this person."

Cellphone video provided to the Tallahassee Democrat shows the crew pulling the man on board.