Whitby motorboat sinking (5): last seconds.

No, I don’t have a picture of the capsized boat. The Whitby Gazette has two, and some excellent pics of the whole sad event here. The pics reinforce the descriptions I’ve been given: ludicrous, incomprehensible* decision by the boat crew, utter heroism from the lifeboat crew.

The Gazette also has a new pic of the seconds before the final sinking here. It shows the boat still afloat off the East Pier. According to eyewitness accounts, by this point the two male crew had been swept overboard and were in the water off the West Pier, the woman was still aboard and on the phone to the emergency services. The boat is broadside on to a 10-15 foot wave that is about to break.

* There are two reasons I can think of for the boat trying to get to sea that day. Stupidity is one.