SAN DIEGO — A search is underway after three Americans who were to set sail for the U.S. from Mazatlán, Mexico, and haven't been seen or heard from in more than 10 days.
Kerry O’Brien, Frank O’Brien and William Gross reportedly left April 4, and intended to make a provisions stop in Cabo San Lucas, roughly 200 nautical miles across the Sea of Cortez, on April 6 before heading to San Diego, the U.S. Coast Guard said.
"However, there was no record of them arriving in Cabo San Lucas or a report in of their location," the Coast Guard said in a statement Friday.
Gross' daughter, Melissa Spicuzza, said the O'Briens invited her father to sail with them and he jumped at the chance because he loves being on the water, according to NBC San Diego. She said her father lives on a boat on San Diego Bay.
Each missing American, Spicuzza said, has decades of sailing experience, and the O'Briens have Coast Guard captain's licenses, required for voyages with paying passengers.
"I'm just wanting my dad, my dad and the O’Briens, to roll back in and say, ‘What’s going on guys?'” she told the station.
The Mexican navy was leading the search for the three, and the Coast Guard was helping, the U.S. military branch said.
Searchers have contacted marinas in Baja, Mexico, but no one has reported seeing the trio's boat, a LaFitte model 44 sailing yacht, the Coast Guard said.
Urgent marine broadcasts via VHF radio have so far turned up no reports of the sailors or the 44-foot vessel, the Ocean Bound, it said.
The model was sold in the 1970s and 1980s by LaFitte Yachts Inc. of Newport Beach. The company said it was conceived by noted yacht designer Robert Perry as "the ultimate cruising yacht hull," according to marketing material from the time.
The National Weather Service reported that seas along the Baja coast Saturday included waves as high as 10 feet.
Anyone with information on the trio's whereabouts or that of the vessel is asked to contact the Coast Guard.
