The Associated Press
BARNEGAT LIGHT, N.J. — Three crew members who used a lifeboat to flee their burning vessel off New Jersey’s coast have been pulled to safety by workers aboard a passing ship.
They’re unharmed.
The three were aboard the 80-foot Captain OJ Riggs when its engine caught fire early Sunday just east of Barnegat Light, a community of a few hundred residents on Long Beach Island.
One crew member contacted another boat, whose crew relayed the call to the Coast Guard.
A rescue helicopter and a rescue boat from New Jersey and a cutter based in Atlantic Beach, N.C., responded.
Meanwhile, crew members aboard another boat pulled the three to safety. The Coast Guard extinguished the fire, but the Captain OJ Riggs Broke apart and sank.
The incident is under investigation.