Transcription
Hey everybody, I'm Ashley Banfield and this is Drop Dead Serious. Um, this is uh Hopetown Inn and Marina I'm coming to you from in the Bahamas. Um, specifically Elbow Key. This is the last place Lynette Hooker was seen before allegedly going off the back of the dinghy that she shared with her husband Brian Hooker um, and vanishing. And the story has been such a mystery. And boy, have I been able to talk to some people who are putting some pieces together.
Specifically, the folks who were involved in the search and rescue, the folks who actually spent time with Brian Hooker, the folks who saw and retrieved the dinghy off the shore, the folks who had Brian Hooker in their boat, two different guys. Um, the people who spoke with him at length went over to Soulmate actually retrieved the dinghy and got it back up on Soulmate. Uh, I should let you know that the music that you're hearing is a wedding. I think it's like a wedding party. Take a look over here. This is again Hopetown Inn and Marina and it's really nice over there. They're having this lovely little event. So, you'll hear the music and probably some lively merriment. Just FYI, that lighthouse right there, that lighthouse is a candy stripe lighthouse. It's one of the only ones around that is actually kerosene and hand cranked. Super interesting. It's a very interesting point, like tourist point of interest in uh in um Elbow Key and and particularly Hopetown uh and the marina that I'm at.
So, let me get you started. Um I spoke with Pete Colin and Pete is with the Hopetown Fire and Rescue. He's a team leader. He responded on Sunday morning, April 5th. That of course uh is the morning uh that Brian Hooker had washed up on the shores of Marsh Harbor, four miles away from where I am, four miles away from Elbow Key. And Pete Colling uh sprang into action as a volunteer uh fire and rescue personnel. Right. and he not only um was out and about looking like everyone else was on the shores for Lynette Hooker, he was also with Brian Hooker. You're going to hear his entire story and it is fascinating because he knows a lot about this area. He lives here with his wife more than 10 years I believe and he works for the you know the the fire and rescue.
Um, I want to tell you about some things that happened in the last uh, you know, 12 to 24 hours. This is a small community. It's it's a 7 mile long island. And so there's only a couple hundred residents here, but rumors spread like wildfire here. And last night, and I'm recording this on April 16th, Thursday, last night around 10:30 at night, I'm busy with Lindsay. We're putting the podcast together to get it out to you from yesterday. We got word that a body had been found. um and specifics like locations, uh shallow grave, police activity. So, we hopped to it, which is not easy because we're on water. We had to get a ferry from this little spot right here uh to take us back there and to connect um to um to the Hopetown um main mainland, so to speak, cuz I'm on the marina. And we hightailed it back to the Abaco Inn where we heard originally the police activity was happening. Police activity was happening. Nothing was happening there. Nothing at all. And then we moved a little further to the Sea Spray Inn and Marina where we heard this is where it's actually happened. This is where the shallow grave is. Nothing happening there. Absolutely nothing. Not only was there no police activity, there was no activity at all. And the people who work at the Sea Spray said it's been quiet and there might have only been like one patron left and it was they were really wrapping up the night. There was absolutely no truth to this rumor. And all around the island today, people have said, "Did you hear? Did you hear? Did you hear?" It ain't true. So, rumor dispelled. And they do go like wildfire. And I mean, 10:30, 11:30 at night, ain't fun to have to get out on the water, cross over, drive 10 minutes, and start investigating whether this was true. But we did it and we figured it out. Crickets. It ain't true.
The other piece of interest um is that uh Carly Ellsworth, that's Lynette Hooker's daughter, she arrived here yesterday in Nassau, which is a solid flight away, like a you know, 30-minute flight. Um and then today she and her boyfriend Steve arrived here in in Marsh Harbor. Marsh Harbor is about four miles from here. Again, I'm on Elbow Key. Marsh Harbor's four miles away. Brian said that Lynette went overboard and took the key with her and he had to float without any operations four miles all the way over to Marsh Harbor. So anyway, they've landed in Marsh Harbor and they think that they're going to That's the ferry by the way. Um, they think they're going to make it over here to Elbow Key maybe tomorrow. So we'll keep an eye out for them. Meanwhile, today there was police activity as we've seen just about every day, right? So, I can tell you this, the Americans that we've spotted, you know, the ones with the the search dog with the cadaver dog, uh, we saw a photograph of them getting on a ferry and the witness who took the photograph saw the dog, cute little dog with the sheriff collar that we saw yesterday, Maggie. Um, we saw them, uh, this was an 8 a.m. ferry from Hopetown to Marsh Harbor. I thought that was odd because the Royal Bahamian Police Force should I think should be coming over and getting them because they've got the they've got the the boats here, but they took a public ferry to to get over to Marsh Harbor with the dog. Also in a separate incident um three uh representatives of the same group that we saw yesterday, the the US Coast Guard investigators, three of them were seen uh searching Marsh Harbor in the area where Brian's dinghy washed up. So that's about 150 yards uh south of the boatyard. And uh you're going to see a lot more information um that pertains to those locations uh throughout this podcast. But um so there's lots of activity still uh searching at Marsh Harbor, activity on Marsh Harbor. Also the Americans heading early this morning at 10 at 8:00 a.m. to Marsh Harbor and then the searches that they saw going on uh three of them on Marsh Harbor 2 hours later. So it's still busy. It's still busy and it's still active. And there are a lot of people who have um shared information, some of it accurate, some of it not accurate. Some will say, "I heard it on TikTok." So, we're always careful about that. But they're clearly getting a good handle on the last movements of Brian and Lynette.
Anyway, I want you to hear my conversation with Pete Colling. When we spoke with Pete, um, we went to the Firefly Resort, and you'll recognize that if you saw our previous podcast, uh, here from Elbow Key as one of the places that Brian and Lynette Hooker spent some time on the last day that anyone saw her. They were at the Firefly from 11:00 a.m. until possibly around 4 because they picked up anchor from just off the uh shore of the Firefly. And they took the Soulmate yacht that they live on up about I mean not even a quarter mile towards the Abaco Inn and Resort where she was last seen by anyone else other than Brian. Anyway, I want you to hear my conversation with Pete Colling. He is the team leader with the Hopetown um volunteer fire and rescue. He was there that morning um about 7:00 in the morning when they were searching for Lynette and they were dealing with the story of Brian who just washed up on shore a couple hours earlier, right? And they're learning what he has to say, matching it up with the environment, with the winds, with the waves. So Pete's got a lot of great information. uh he's a firsthand um witness of everything that happened that morning, but he also spent time with Brian. And that to me was very interesting. I I wanted to ask him a lot of questions about what Brian said, what his demeanor was, and uh and what kind of activity he had that he would spend time one-on-one uh with with Brian Hooker. Here's my conversation with Pete Colling.
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>> So, let's start. Um, take me back to that morning and how the morning was for you. What happened?
>> Um, we received the initial call, uh, came into Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue at 5:12 a.m. Um, I personally, uh, didn't get out there until later on in the morning. Um, but five of our members got on our on the fire and rescue boat um, almost immediately and went and liaised with the local police um, where the dinghy was over in Marsh Harbor. and I caught up with them a couple hours later um with another member of the department on his private boat and we canvassed the area south of where the dinghy was found um in an effort to try and you know just see what we could see out there. didn't find anything the first day we were out there. Um, you know, we understood uh the basic facts of what he told the police when he first uh made contact with them, which was where she'd gone overboard, what time that was roughly, you know, when he made it to land and um that he had lost an oar in the process.
>> he said he lost an oar?
>> That's what he told the police. Yeah.
>> Um, said that he had at some point anchored his dinghy um, fired a flare?
>> Um.
>> Single flare or fired multiple flares. What did he was he clear about it?
>> Wasn't clear about that.
>> Okay.
>> Um.
>> But said he fired something.
>> That was that was what we understood again and this was the information.
>> You know this area, you know boating, you know um mariners. Uh if if someone fires a flare at 8:00 at night, it's dark here. Would everybody see it and know, oh my god, there's a flare? You would think.
>> Um, you know, it's not impossible that it would go unnoticed. Um, you know, we have to obviously be most concerned with with the facts and you know, it's it's not probable but it is possible that you know, he fired a flare and there was just nobody there to see it. But highly, I would say it's pretty unlikely.
>> Saturday night it's busy, right? The anchorages are busy and if we did, if somebody sees a flare, word gets around and and fire and rescue's notified. And we were not notified that night of of any flares being set off.
>> You know, I I think about uh I've spent a lot of time on boats and sunset is one of the nicest and busiest times to be out on the back of your boat, not inside the cabin, not noticing if there's something in the sky. Would that be accurate to say a lot of people on a Saturday night would be out on their boats on the anchorage?
>> For sure, there would have been a a good few people around.
>> That could have seen a flare.
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah. But no one reported a flare anywhere.
>> Not to our knowledge. No.
>> Tell me what um your experience was when you first encountered Brian.
>> Um, another member of the department and I um, so this is Monday morning. Um, Sunday was the initial day of of searching. Um, and Monday morning after that, we had spoken with the local police and um told them that we were going to go and retrieve the dinghy. So, another member of the department and I went over in his personal boat. And um his boat was a little bit smaller. It could get in to to this small places. and we went over there um located the dinghy and you know, I pulled up, kind of jumped off in waist deep water and and and went over to the dinghy.
>> You're the first person to encounter the dinghy that was beached up on Marsh Harbor.
>> Uh, first person from the department, I believe. Um, and and nothing was moved around there. We had uh, things that I noticed was, you know, there was one oar in there.
>> Was it broken? Cuz he told his friends he had a broken oar.
>> No, there was only one. Um, but he um, there's only one one oar in the boat. There was a spent flare. Um, I only noticed one.
>> Flare gun.
>> Flare gun.
>> And it, you were you were you could tell it had been fired.
>> Correct.
>> Um, there were two PFDs, two orange life jackets that were there.
>> Um.
>> On the bottom of the uh floor of the dinghy.
>> Just just on the floor of the dinghy. And um.
>> Do they look old or waterlogged or that they wouldn't be useful? They were only there for legal purposes. Like is there any chance they were useless?
>> Probably not, you know. Um, they just looked like every other orange life jacket I've ever seen in anyone's boat around here.
>> Mhm.
>> Um, but it uh, the the anchor was tied around a tree um on the beach, which we untied. Um, put everything on the boat and um.
>> This is kind of a rough landing, right? As I understand it where he beached up. It was a rocky and.
>> Yeah, it was it's rocky. It's not easy to to traverse the terrain around there for sure. There's no, you know, immediate roads, paths, stuff like that. It was it was pretty pretty rugged. So for him to get from the landing spot where he says he well he washed up on shore to the boatyard.
>> How tough is that? Because he said he'd gone through some bramble and it was difficult.
>> It it it wouldn't be an easy, it wouldn't be an easy walk for sure. It would take you a little while. It's not just like a walking path and you know, five-minute walk to somebody. It was it was.
>> It would have been a trek. Not easy, especially in the in the middle of the night.
>> Would it have taken say um 10 minutes or an hour?
>> Depend, you know, you got to put yourself in someone's position there and and and assume that, you know, you don't know exactly where you're going. So, it it could have, it could have feasibly taken him an hour to get from where he landed to to actually make contact with somebody.
>> Okay.
>> 4 or 5:00 in the morning, nobody's around, you know.
>> And it's dark.
>> Yeah.
>> Sun comes up around 6.
>> It could have happened. Yeah.
>> Okay. We're trying to account for like the nine hours. He said she went overboard at 7:30 and he didn't wash up on Marsh Harbor till 4:00 a.m.
>> Um, captain, I was, and of course we're in a restaurant, so it's a little bit noisy. You can hear some of the people dining above us. But um, the captain I was talking to said he swam that distance in two hours in a in a race once.
>> It's a long distance. It's four miles.
>> You know.
>> It's it's it's entirely possible again.
>> Um.
>> But you think it would take 9 hours to float? Let's cut one hour off for the getting through the bramble and all the rest. So, eight, seven and a half, eight hours to float all that way in a wind.
>> The the the fact of the matter is is with a chain of poor decisions, it could have taken somebody that long. Not likely, but but not impossible. Um, you know, if if just drifting with the wind that I'm estimating would have taken three or four hours.
>> Three or four hours. About half the time that he says it took.
>> Yeah. So, again, his his account of the situation was that he threw the anchor out for a while, stopped, fired some flares, was trying to get you a passing boat. Oh, there you go.
>> That's, you know, again, the his his in my mind, and again, this is not a any police or official capacity, but but given the the timeline that he gave.
>> Um.
>> Not not probable, not.
>> Something that, you know, we we would typically see, but it's it's not impossible. like impossible if if he did what he said he did and anchored for a while and was trying to flag boats and and do all of that and then finally gave up and decided just to, to drift and and make his way to where he made his way to. Um, and then eventually trek to find somebody. It it it could have taken that long.
>> So did he um what was his demeanor when you encountered him?
>> Well, we went to we went to pick up uh the dinghy that Monday morning. Um, brought it to him, pulled up alongside his boat. Uh, he was just gratitude was the first thing. He was very happy that we had, you know, showed up um, that we went and brought him his dinghy um, so that he could get around. He said he was looking forward to, you know, he he wanted to pull pull the anchor so that he could get his boat back to Marsh Harbor. He said he had some friends and family that were arriving that were going to help him with the search. So, we were happy to to to help him out. uh helped him get his dinghy on board and um, yeah, he was he was just very grateful, seemed um stoic and you know, not not overly emotional.
>> Did he.
>> I mean, listen, it's hard. Everyone's different. Did he seem like the kind of guy who just lost his wife at sea a few hours earlier?
>> I honestly hate to to to you know, everyone is different. um, you know, he's uh from what I could see from his tattoos was an ex-Marine. Uh.
>> He had USMC tattooed on his um on his shoulder.
>> So that was one of the things that kind of um led me to believe he was just a little bit more, you know, all business, stoic. I've I've I've you know, been around a lot of sailors living here for 10 years and and you know, he was just very matter-of-actual. We need to do this and then we need to do this and I need to get out of here and I need to go and and pick up my family and continue the search. So that was that was it. I didn't um, you know, we we were both both grew up in Michigan or I grew up in Michigan anyway. Had a little bit of small talk about being from Michigan.
>> You connected.
>> But that was it.
>> Connected about Kalamazoo.
>> Yeah. Exactly. So um, you know.
>> That was uh that was about the the extent of the small talk. Everything else was just business. I helped him get his um his boat off anchor, you know.
>> Um, he pulled up the windless, got the anchor up, and.
>> You uh went to the the beached dinghy at Marsh Harbor.
>> Correct.
>> Hooked it up and towed it across back to here, Elbow Key, where Soulmate was um was anchored, correct?
>> And he was in the boat with you guys.
>> He was He was in He was No, he was in his boat. We We didn't take him with us. So.
>> He didn't take. Oh, he came back in the dinghy.
>> So.
>> No, the dinghy had no power. How did he get how again?
>> How did you all get back from the beached uh dinghy at Marsh Harbor back to here at.
>> Elbow Key.
>> We we took a private boat over there. Um, another member in the department and I took a boat over there, hooked up to his dinghy, towed his dinghy back to Soulmate, which is where Brian was at the time, so he was already on the boat.
>> Someone else brought him back over to Soulmate.
>> Correct. And tell me what it was like when you were towing the dinghy back because I think you've got a really good description of what that dinghy was like.
>> I tell you what, it was uh I I wouldn't want that thing. Um, it was light. If you've ever towed a uh a tube with nobody on it, it was kicking up quite a bit. You could tell it was it was light. It was more of a a a sail than a boat. Caught a lot of wind. The waves, you know, were going into the wind and it was just it was really um, you know, not not not something that I would I would want to be in in any kind of rough seas. So, it was it was a, you know, not even a rigid inflatable. Um, it was basically just like a molded fiberglass, really light, sat high out of the water and and, you know, that was um.
>> Yeah, that was my my my impression of of of that thing that was just kind of a cheap made dinghy. And so, um, if you put, uh, you know, two people on it, presumably around 150 lb and say 200 lb, you got 350 lb on that, big difference or would you still say still really unstable?
>> It's it it was a it was a small light dinghy to begin with. So, um, you know, that's not uh, again, tough to say in the in the conditions, but it certainly wasn't a a a rugged, stable boat to start off with. So, you know, again, I'm, you know, want to want to reiterate, I'm I'm I'm mostly concerned with with the facts and and trying to give every bit of the benefit of the doubt. But, um, you know, it's not impossible that somebody could fall out of that, right? That was my that was my impression that that, you know, if it caught the right wind, it would would be a little bit unstable.
>> Do you remember the winds on Saturday night, April 4th, around 7:30?
>> I don't, to be honest with you. There was a few other members of the department that were out that night um just out and about and uh, you know, they commented on on the direction and and the force of the wind that it was it was kind of substantial and I know you know it it had been windy all week um a lot of people wanting to go fishing that couldn't, that kind of thing. So, but I personally don't remember the exact conditions that night.
>> From what I understand um captain, we've been working with was out that night, said it was about an 18 knot wind and of course you're on the leeward side on this side of Elbow Key. It can be screaming over on the other side, but it's nice and protected here. An 18 knot wind. What would it be like um just outside that channel at um Abaco Inn?
>> Honestly, it would still probably be about an 18 knot wind. There's, you know, that that that inlet right there at White Sound, you know, there's there's not a whole lot of elevation to cut down that wind. So, that comes up and then goes right back down again. So, by the time you're all the way at the end of the channel, there's that that wind's not getting cut too much, to be honest. So the the the dinghy was light like a sail, almost like an inner tube as as we see them bouncing in the wind behind a boat. Not very stable. A wind with even 400, 350 pounds on it, still you think that could be um a plausible story that she just bounced off.
>> Again, not not likely, but but but plausible. It it could happen.
>> Tell me about.
>> In my opinion.
>> In your opinion. Yeah. Well, it's important because you're from here. You know the winds. You know the boating lifestyle. You're a boater yourself. You're fire and rescue.
>> I live here. I'm not from here.
>> You live here.
>> I'm not a local.
>> I think after 10 years you can say you're from here.
>> Not exactly.
>> I don't know how long it takes for you to actually be officially from here, but uh, you know, you know a thing or two. You know more than I do. That's for sure. Um, okay. So when you got back to Brian's boat with the inflatable, well with the um with the dinghy, take me from there.
>> Um, we helped him hoist the boat up onto Soulmate. Um, clipped into the to the dinghy, hoisted it up. Um, gave him his oar back, which he put on on Soulmate on his boat.
>> It's on the, it's now on the sailboat. It's on the keel boat. The oar that was in the bottom of the dinghy is now back on the keel boat.
>> Mhm. And, um, that was it. As I said, there wasn't a lot of wasn't a ton of small talk. It was just um, you know.
>> You hoisted the dinghy up.
>> Hoisted the dinghy up onto his onto his boat. Um, I was at the helm. I helped him keep the boat facing into the wind while he used the windless to get the anchor up. He got the anchor up, got the anchor secured, came back, took the helm from me. Um, I jumped back into my colleague's boat and wished him all the best. and um, he said he was going to, you know, potentially reach out to try and get somebody else that had a boat that could help him um and his friends and family continue the search.
>> He mentioned that to you.
>> Yes.
>> And did he ever reach out to you?
>> He did.
>> And what did he say?
>> Uh, he was interested in um either renting a boat or or or hiring a boat with a captain. Uh, I gave him the names of of of a couple people around here. Um, and that was about the end of it.
>> Did he call any of them?
>> I believe he did. I don't know what came of of of that. Whether he ended up going out with them or not, I honestly don't know.
>> This was all on the on the Sunday, Easter Sunday. Um, she's gone missing the night before.
>> This was this was the Monday.
>> This was the Monday.
>> Correct.
>> So, he would have had Monday during the day, Tuesday, and then Wednesday he was arrested. He wouldn't have been able to get out.
>> Yeah.
>> Not sure, not sure whether he made it out with with anybody or not. Did he ever say anything to you like I'm not leaving here um until I find her or that I plan to search until I find her? Any comments like that?
>> Yeah, he did. He, you know, that was his uh, you know, I I wished him the best of luck with his search and uh, he said, "Well, I'll be around. I'm not leaving until I find her."
>> He said that to you, too.
>> He did.
>> Not leaving till I find her.
>> So, were you surprised to find out yesterday he got on a plane and left?
>> I was actually. Um, there's a lot of things about this situation that surprised me. Um, and that was definitely one of them.
>> It, you know, before we started this interview, we had breakfast here. It's such a lovely spot.
>> Fireside, Firefly, Firefly Inn. Firefly Inn.
>> It was a lovely place.
>> Yeah. Most of the time.
>> Breakfast.
>> Um.
>> They were here um they were here uh earlier in the day. Did anybody from here say anything about them?
>> No, I I I personally hadn't heard anything about, you know, their activities earlier on. Um, I know that it was confirmed that they were at Abaco Inn um that night before they left. Um, and that's honestly all I know. I I've I've heard they were here, but I haven't heard that directly from anybody that saw them here.
>> I've asked as many people as I can. Um, they seemed somewhat nondescript, like they didn't make a huge impression. And sometimes in stories like this, we'll hear they had a huge fight, they were drunk, and and he was mad or she was mad. But we haven't heard anything like that. Has anybody discussed that? Have you heard on the island that there was a particular behavior that was unique before she went missing?
>> I've I've heard a lot of rumors about a lot of things on this island um and and about this case in particular, but I I haven't heard that from from anybody yet.
>> I haven't either. And I've spoken to people who were at the Abaco Inn. Uh a guy last night who worked there that night and didn't even know that they were there. Didn't recognize the description of this couple. They spent some time at the pool, had two rounds of drinks, that's it. Bacardi light and soda each. And no other, there was no other big bold moment that was memorable, which is surprising given the, you know, if the, you know, if some of the theories that the police are working turn out to be that there was actually an attack, if there was something like that that happened, you would think something would precede that. And I'm not hearing a lot of that.
>> Yeah, I haven't heard that from anybody.
>> The other thing that um I talked with some of the law enforcement folks about is this is the Sea of Abaco. It's very shallow. I was out on the boat. I could see the bottom all the way across. If there were a body in the Sea of Abaco, you guys always find it, don't you? I mean, it's not often that you don't find someone who's gone overboard or had a drowning or.
>> Um, look, every situation is different. Um, you know, there we we haven't had uh any instances in the last 10 years of of anybody going missing at sea and not being found. Um, there was one here uh in 2015 where a young man, a local guy went missing off of his boat and his body was never found.
>> There's Marsh Harbor, right?
>> Correct. That's that's over in Marsh Harbor. So.
>> And there's deeper water over there.
>> Not really.
>> Not really.
>> No.
>> No. It's it's it's pretty shallow between here and and and the mainland or the big island of of Great Abaco. Um, but we did, you know, on on that Monday, or sorry, on the Sunday uh after myself and another member of the department helped our initial, we after we did our initial canvassing of the Marsh Harbor side. So to the north and south of of where the dinghy was found. Um, we went back just here to where she allegedly went over. um started there and basically did about a 40° cone of of where she went over and.
>> Measuring the wind out the possibilities of the wind.
>> Correct. And uh we we kind of did a a triangle between um the entrance to White Sound Channel, which is where she went off the boat, uh the north end of Lubbers, and uh a little rock called Porgie Rock, which basically kind of made a triangle right in that area, which was, you know, you just kind of think if somebody got disoriented and and things weren't exactly um, you know, didn't happen where where he said they did or whatever. Um, we we canvassed that area for another two hours. Um, that triangle and then in between it back and forth and back and forth. I was on the the front of the boat just checking the ground um looking for anything.
>> You'd see it. You'd see a body if the body was in there, right? So clear. The water is so.
>> Certainly believe so. The the the water's pretty clear around here and and fairly shallow. So.
>> There were also drones up and there was uh aircraft and sonar that was used.
>> Um, US Coast Guard uh did bring an aircraft over. They flew a grid as well um from Marsh Harbor to, you know, where the the where she fell out of the boat originally. Um, you know, as I said, we've we we had a lot of our team members that were walking uh along the shore here of Elbow Key and as as well as around uh the shore at Lubbers, um, which is the smaller island just to the west. And um, you know, nobody found anything on on the Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. You know, the the winds were kind of up and down, so it was I believe until Tuesday until we could get a drone up. um looked the whole north end of Lubbers. Um, didn't, you know, no trace of anything. The only thing that was that was found um again, some some colleagues, some some other members of the department went out and found the green flotation device.
>> Where was that? Where was that found?
>> Um, a few hundred feet from where the dinghy was. So it it kind of it it fit with with the scenario that he painted, which was he threw that, you know, if that if the dinghy um went in that direction, the flotation device, the green flotation device was was found pretty close.
>> I'm trying to think about that. uh you're, you know, all the way across the Elbow Key and you throw the the flotation device and the dinghy and the flotation device take the exact same trip over.
>> That does make sense.
>> Within a couple hundred feet.
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah. I mean, like I said, the wind is the determining factor on on where things are going to end up on that day. So the other big question would be he says that Lynette went over with the dry bag that had their passports and the extra.
>> The other big thing is that Lynette um.
>> No, it's okay. It was just we were just fixing that.
>> Brian says that Lynette went over with the dry bag with the passports and I think the extra spare key uh to the um electric engine.
>> Mhm.
>> Wouldn't a dry bag float?
>> Yes, it would.
>> And it hasn't been found anywhere.
>> It We've We've Nobody's to to the best of my knowledge, nobody's found that at all.
>> Did he ever describe how big it was?
>> No, I I didn't, you know, again, I'm I'm not with the police department. I I try and stay away from investigation and and and things like that. I'm just.
>> Fire and rescue and and just try and do my best to act on what they want us to do.
>> Um, and they wanted us to to canvas the area that we did and and, you know, we didn't find anything and and, you know, the dinghy and the flotation device, flotation device was found a couple hundred.
>> Feet south of where the dinghy was.
>> Towards the point, towards the uh.
>> Towards Witch's Point. Yeah.
>> Yeah.
>> Okay.
>> So that was uh that's that that's it. No no no dry bag. No no no other traces of of anything that um we think could have been from from her boat.
>> From your cone that you measured out. Um, as you look out from Elbow Key towards Lubbers and way in the distance, 4 miles away, Marsh Harbor.
>> Do you think that his his pathway of floating um with an unmanned boat, you know, an an inoperable boat.
>> Would have put him up on Lubbers or would it have more plausibly, you know, cleared Lubbers and gone right all the way across to Marsh Harbor where he did land?
>> It it it would have been close for sure. So where where she went overboard and where the wind was pushing them, it is again, it's it's definitely feasible that what he said happened happened. It's possible that that that his scenario is correct that she went over in that point based on based on the wind direction. It is.
>> It's possible that that's where the dinghy ended up.
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When you um boarded Soulmate at anchor, the last place that Lynette and Brian dropped anchor before going into the Abaco Inn and they never got back to it that night. If you um believed Brian's story, they didn't make it back to to the yacht. When you boarded it, how far off land was it anchored?
>> Um, 200 yards.
>> 200 yards.
>> I'd say. Yeah. It wasn't, you know, they if if you've got a.
>> I mean, that's that's basically that blue boat or maybe the white boat.
>> The white boat.
>> The white boat right out you see behind. Yeah. This white boat right here.
>> So.
>> They weren't far off land. Um, you know, the closer you tuck into the to towards land, the you know, you cut down on the wind a little bit. So.
>> Right on a path.
>> He was anchored right off Apat's Bay. Yes.
>> 200 yards from shore.
>> Approximately.
>> And did he ever say exactly where it was she went overboard?
>> He I I didn't question him. We didn't talk about the incident that night. Okay. Um, again, he was very matter-of-factual. Just wanted to get the boat up, get the anchor up, and and get back to Marsh Harbor to pick up his family. That was his.
>> If you were sure, if you were in a small dinghy like they were, it's 8 feet. It's tiny. Uh, and you were coming out of the Abaco Inn, you kind of hug the land. You don't take the channel way out into the deeper water like the, you know, the vessels that draw more, you know, draft than than the little dinghies can pretty much scoot over, you know, 2 ft of water.
>> Yeah, that's that's true.
>> So they'd be close to land as they were heading. They go as the crow flies to the yacht. Most people would.
>> Well, certainly if you're if you're fighting wind.
>> Yeah.
>> At 7:30 at night.
>> Yeah.
>> With a two horsepower, three horsepower, four horsepower. I'm not sure what it was, but it's tiny.
>> It was a little electric engine. And and you know, again, that was that would be uh the more likely scenario that.
>> They would cut that corner and and and stay closer to land there.
>> Sharks in there in that in that shallow area.
>> Absolutely.
>> Absolutely. I can 100% guarantee that there are bull sharks in that vicinity at sundown every day.
>> At sundown. And this is sundown. And the fishermen come in around 5:30, which draws even more um shark activity.
>> Yeah.
>> Right near Mary's, which is even further south, right? Mary's Creek is further south. There's a lot of shark.
>> Activity. There's there's a couple docks that uh people, you know, come to clean their fish at the end of the day and and that's one of them. So, um, yeah, there have, you know, there it's pretty well known that there are sharks in the area. Um, it's very rare that they attack anybody. There's only been one shark attack here in 15 years that I know of on the island. Knock on wood. Um, but that's uh always a a reality of living out here. But someone else mentioned to me, if a shark had attacked her, there'd be something, some evidence left.
>> You would think something would would would wash up, an article of clothing or anything like that.
>> They don't necessarily devour an entire person, uh, is the way it was described to me.
>> Correct. So nothing along that shore uh indicated that there had been a shark attack, say 200 yards or within 200 yards of shore.
>> Right.
>> Yeah. Um, when you were with Brian for that short period of time, what would you say it was about an hour all told that you were with him?
>> Ah, not even, maybe half an hour, 45 minutes.
>> Did he ever seem defensive, like offering up lots of excuses and reasons for why, you know, what happened happened?
>> Nope. No, again, he was very, very matter-of-factual about what needed to get done. He was just um, you know, like a lot of boat captains when you're on their boat was just like, "I need you here. I need you to do this. You're going to do that." And then we're gone and.
>> And that was it. Just um very uh very efficient, matter-of-factual about the whole thing.
>> What are your I mean, listen, you've been at this a long time. Um, we talked again before we began this interview over breakfast and and you said when you live on an island that's this small and you're in fire and rescue, you rescue a lot of people you know and you actually rescue a lot of people that you know that have died. So, you know this business, you know this kind of a scenario. What are your overall thoughts about what's transpired in this?
>> Uh, it's it's odd, no doubt. There are a lot of unanswered questions. there's a lot of um things that that don't meet the typical I I guess time frame and and and all that that um one would expect. But I also know that a uh series of bad decisions when you're out on the water um, you know, one one poor decision followed by another can can things can get really um really dangerous really quickly out there, even even on the inside.
>> To the inside.
>> And and we're on the inside. Yeah. And um, so it's it's it's tough. I I I try and give uh everyone the benefit of the doubt and I try to, you know, just focus on the facts of what happened and and yeah, you know, there are a lot of unanswered questions. Um, you know, obviously having no trace of of of Lynette to this point is troubling for everybody. Um, most of all her family and that's what we're, you know, that that's that's what I'm most concerned with is is is getting them some some information around this. So, you know, it it's I I try not to pass judgment. I I'm not the police. I'm not the Coast Guard. I'm not here to to say whether I think um there was any ill will, whether there was, you know, I I I can't speak to his intentions um or or, you know, honestly, he's he's the only one that knows exactly what happened that night. But, um, you know, I I do know that things can can get out of hand pretty quickly. Um, and you know, when you're out on the water, uh, if you don't make the right decisions, it it can it can spiral out of control pretty quickly. So.
>> He admitted that. He said, "I didn't throw the anchor fast enough. I uh didn't jump out and uh we'd been drinking and we weren't wearing life jackets." So, he did say it was a a lot of bad decisions. If his story is true, if his story isn't true, and that's a big if, we don't know that. Um, would we have found her by now? you know, with the conditions out here, um, we can only hope, right, that we we we would we hope that we're going to get something to um to get us a step closer to to figuring out what actually went on that night. But it's um.
>> I mean, we're almost two weeks. We're coming up on Saturday. Today's Thursday.
>> Uh, that's that's a lot of days to be out at sea floating if if what he says is true.
>> Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, we're we're going to keep looking. We'll keep, you know, canvassing all all the areas that we can and um, you know, just try and think of every plausible scenario and and try and find some some evidence to support any of those scenarios and that's all we can do.
>> Well, we're behind you and good luck and I hope that, like you said, you can help in some way get resolution for her family. Her daughter's flown out here now and her mom is devastated. Um, they just feel so in the dark as one would. But, um, good luck. Thank you for your service. Volunteer service. Let's remind everybody um you and all of your fellow uh fire and rescue.
>> Yes. So, thank you. We are uh Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue is a as I said, volunteer organization. We are 100% relying on donations. So, you know, second homeowners, travelers, people that we help out. um, you know, we we don't get any government assistance and and we are 100% reliant on donations to keep us going um with our our gear, training, maintenance, which is huge, uh fuel for the boats, all that kind of stuff. So, uh htvfr.org for anybody that wants to help.
>> HT Volunteer Fire and Rescue.org or.
>> HT, say it again. H VFR.
>> Correct.org.
>> htvfr.org. You can uh donate there if you if you want.
>> Okay. Appreciate it.
>> Great cause and uh and you know, continue the good work and thank you, thank you for your time and thank you for being so.
>> Uh, candid. Appreciate it.
>> Trying to help. Thanks.