CAPE MAY — On May 5, the Marine Board of Inquiry seeking information about the March 24 sinking of the scallop boat Lady Mary heard testimony from forensic toxicologist Dr. Anthony Costantino and Jose Luis Arias Pena, sole survivor of the doomed vessel.
Both testified at the U.S. Coast Guard Training Center here where the board convened.
Pena told the panel he had worked aboard Lady Mary since 2004. He told the panel that he had gone to sleep in his berth about midnight. The boat’s owner, Timothy Smith, was also asleep, he said. Four other crewmembers were working on deck with Captain Royal Smith Jr. at the wheel.
At 5 a.m. Timothy Smith yelled, “Wake up, there is a problem on the ship,” said Pena, who speaks mostly Spanish and was aided through a translator.
“We were starting to sink,” Pena added.
The Lady Mary was listing to one side and was taking on water, he said. The scallop dredge was not on the deck, it was in the water, he continued.
“People were running around in desperation and panic,” he said.
Pena ran to the pilothouse where there were four survival suits, and he and Timothy Smith donned their suits. He said there were three other suits in the berthing area, making a total of seven survival suits aboard.
Pena then went out on deck. By then, the vessel had taken on significant water, he said.
The water level was up to the port (left) side winch. He said the boat’s engine was running, but the vessel was going nowhere.
Pena then jumped into the water, and was face up and paddled about 25-feet away from the boat. He feared being sucked down with the boat, he said.
Pena saw the Lady Mary slip beneath the surface. He grabbed an eight-foot plank from the boat, and that is what he clung to until a Coast Guard helicopter arrived about two hours later.
“I felt like I was born again,” when he saw the helicopter, he said.
During questioning by LCMDR Tracy Phillips, Pena said all seemed well when he went to sleep around midnight other than the seas being a little rough. When he ran out on deck after being awakened, he said the boat was leaning to the port side and there was water in the galley and covering about one-third of the main deck.
Pena said he could see another fishing boat about a mile away. He estimated wave height at about 12 feet.
He said three to four minutes elapsed from the time he was awakened to the time he jumped into the water.
Pena said he did not see anyone using the ship’s radios or shooting off flares.
The boat’s scallop dredge was not on the deck, he said. Photos of the sunken boat show the dredge sitting on the deck, currently in 200 feet of water. He said the dredge tow cable was taught and in the water.
Pena said Capt. Royal Smith Jr. “had the knowledge but could have used a little more experience.” A couple of times Royal Smith Jr. had trouble maneuvering in rough water, said Pena.
He said both Timothy and Royal Smith Jr. were wearing survival suits.
On Monday, Attorney Stevenson Lee Weeks, representing the boat’s owner, Smith and Smith Inc. and Royal Smith Sr., presented the theory to reporters that the Lady Mary sank after its gear became entangled either with another vessel or an obstruction. He also showed a large freighter, the Cap Beatrice was less than a mile away and may have been on an intercept course with the Lady Mary.
Pena testified Tuesday that he did not see any large ships nearby.
LCMDR Brian Province asked if there was a language barrier in receiving instructions from the captain for the two Spanish-speaking crewmembers. Pena said they learned by repeating things on a daily routine.
Mike Duvall, Lady Mary captain from 2002 to 2007, testified that he never laid a full dredge on the bottom because it tended to make the boat turn around and put the stern to the sea. He said other scallopers will lie on the dredge as an anchor but it was a no-no on the Lady Mary. He said a dredge full of scallops could weigh 3,000 pounds.
He called the Lady Mary “a very good boat.” Duvall said he preferred to turn the dredge out to the port side, never on the starboard side.
He said the boat could also be steered from a position by the winch.
Duvall said his working relationship with Royal Smith Jr. was rocky resulting in fistfights more than once. He said it was sometimes difficult to train Royal Smith Jr. who became his replacement.
Duvall said Royal Smith Jr. “wanted to be a captain so bad but I didn’t think he was ready.”
Earlier in the morning, forensic toxicologist Dr. Anthony Costantino, president and chief executive officer of Drug Scan Inc., who was hired by the Coast Guard to interpret all results relating to drug use.
Costantino said he found evidence that Timothy Smith and Royal Smith Jr. both had marijuana in their blood at the time of their deaths.
Timothy Smith had a THC concentration of 5.6 nanograms per milliliter and metabolite of 48 nanograms per milliliter. Royal Smith had 2 nanograms per milliliter and 12 of the metabolite of THC carbolic acid. THC is the active of component of marijuana that cause the euphoric feelings of the drug.
He said if Timothy Smith was an infrequent user of marijuana, the smoking may have taken place 1.5 to 2.5 hours before he stopped metabolizing the drug.
Costantino said he could not interpret whether they had recently smoked marijuana or were chronic users.
Costantino testified that marijuana use could have delayed understanding the nature of their vessel’s situation, and could have slowed their reactions.
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