Three American sailors missing after cruising Mexican coast

Three experienced American sailors that were last seen cruising the Mexican coast have been missing for 11 days, the US Coast Guard said.

Kerry O’Brien, Frank O’Brien and William Gross left the resort town of Mazatlán on April 4 aboard the Ocean Bound, a 44-foot La Fitte, with plans to make one more stop on their journey to San Diego.

The sailors were due to arrive in Cabo San Lucas — a city on the bottom tip of the Baja California peninsula, roughly — 400 miles from Mazatlán just two days later.

“However, there was no record of them arriving in Cabo San Lucas or a report of their location,” the military said.

Their cell phones last pinged off the coast of Mazatlán when they made calls to the Cabo San Lucas marina, likely in an attempt to make docking reservations, their families said in a joint statement.

The three are knowledgeable sailors with a collective 90 years of experience on the open waters. Kerry and Frank both hold Captain’s licenses with the US Coast Guard.

“Ocean Bound is a sturdy older vessel and by many accounts is one of the best sailboats ever constructed,” the families said.

“It can be argued that by today’s standards it is lacking technology. There is also an argument for these sailors who’ve been reading star charts and coastal navigation for most of their lives. Technology can fail simply due to one wire or a power outage. Their collective knowledge and experience will not fail.”

Cmdr. Greg Higgins, search mission coordinator for the US Coast Guard, told CNN that the weather was less than ideal when the group went missing.

“When they began their voyage we know that the conditions were not optimal for that type of trip, though certainly, there were sailing vessels out there during that time. Winds potentially over 30 knots and seas 15 to 20, maybe more, feet at the time of their voyage,” Higgins said.

“It’s a long trip for even in good conditions, from Mazatlán to Cabo. That’s two days, and certainly on to San Diego, which was their eventual destination. And since then it has improved marginally.”

The Mexican Navy is helping the Coast Guard search for the missing sailors, and both have alerted other boaters to keep an eye out for the Ocean Bound and its occupants.

The agencies have widened their search parameters to a “drift projection” in case the sailboat became disabled and is being swept by the waves, and the families are asking boaters as far as South America to be on the lookout.

The Coast Guard is also following a “travel projection” that the Ocean Bound may have followed if the sailors simply lost their radio contact and continued their journey to California.