Four Sonoma County men who survived a fishing boat that went down off the Baja coast early Sunday were on their way home Thursday, making a journey marked by sorrow over two friends they left behind in the Sea of Cortez.
Mexican Navy and the U.S. Coast Guard personnel continued their search Thursday for seven missing fishermen, including Shawn Chaddock of Petaluma and Russ Bautista of Penngrove.
The government escorted 16 of 19 survivors of the capsized boat to the Mexican border so they could return home, most to the Bay Area.
"I'm very relieved," said Amy Tsurumoto, whose son, Sebastopol resident Warren Tsurumoto, survived the disaster. "But I'm so sad that two of his buddies are not found yet."
A caravan of survivors left the coastal town of San Felipe in private vehicles around 8:30 a.m. and was expected to arrive sometime after midnight, she said.
"It will be a sad trip back because those poor guys, they went together and two of them are lost," Tsurumoto said. "That's really hard. It's just like losing your own kid."
Those returning home included Warren Tsurumoto and friends Dave Levine of Bodega Bay, Jim Miller of Penngrove, and Dennis DeLuca of Sebastopol - all with harrowing tales to tell of surviving 16 hours or more at sea.
Four Novato men also survived.
Joelle Bautista, whose husband was one of those still missing, said one of the other men was driving his truck home. But she's not given up on getting her husband back.
Chaddock's family hasn't either, said his brother, Darryl Chaddock, even if it means he and his sister-in-law have to fly to Mexico to search for him themselves.
"One way or another, he's coming home," Darryl Chaddock said Thursday afternoon. "Like I said, it's a big sea and a lot of islands. He's a smart guy. He's tough. He'll make it."
Joelle Bautista said she intended to press the Mexican Navy to continue the search and rescue effort for another week. The Mexican government already has extended the search beyond the 96-hour limit at which they normally would ratchet down the search and shift to recovery mode.
Thursday was the fourth full day of search that began after the 105-foot excursion boat Erik foundered in stormy seas about two miles off the Baja Coast, dumping all 43 people on board - 27 tourists and 16 crew members - into the sea around 2:30 a.m. Sunday.
There was only a sliver of a moon as the stunned passengers found themselves clinging to life vests, ice chests and other floating debris and treading water or kicking like mad for hours, many into evening of the next day, when most were rescued.
Officials have confirmed the death of one fishermen, Leslie Yee, 65, of Ceres, near Modesto.
Dan Dewell, a spokesman for the Coast Guard's District 11 in Alameda, said that although the Mexican Navy is heading the search, command centers for the Navy and the U.S. agency have shared information and assessments of their progress all along.
"Honestly, when you're going through a search you take it a step at at time, a day at a time, and you analyze the results of each day's search to decide if it's time to suspend or not," Dewell said.
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