Barnegat Light Inlet fishing boat sinks after Allen Township man is rescued

Gary Mertz, 52, was aboard the 38-foot 'Southern Comfort' for a day of striped-bass fishing when it ran aground.

As a guest on a deep-sea fishing trip chartered for this morning, Gary Mertz was told the striped bass being caught off New Jersey's Barnegat Light Inlet were between 35 and 50 pounds.

Moments into the excursion, however, the 38-foot-long boat that the Northampton County man and five others were in ran aground and began taking on water before sinking, the U.S. Coast Guard reports.

No one was injured, but the Coast Guard says the ship -- christened "Southern Comfort" -- was carrying about 350 gallons of diesel that poses a threat of pollution.

The vessel’s captain, identified by the Coast Guard as Albert G. Stork, of Forked River, N.J., was gassing the engine to head out to sea beyond the inlet's north jetty of rocks when it struck a partially submerged boulder about 7:45 a.m., according to Mertz, of Allen Township.

"We were just talking on the back of the boat and it just threw everybody, threw me onto the ground, threw another guy into a cabinet, and all the alarms started going off in the boat," Mertz, 52, told the Express-Times.

The boat wasn't going "super fast," Mertz said, and it was only a couple hundred yards from shore. The impact with the rock tore a hole in the hull.

Water rises past ankles

The captain "got on the radio, started calling for the Coast Guard, 'Mayday, mayday,' that the boat was taking on water," Mertz said. "It started filling up on one side. It was up to my ankle."

The water was halfway up to his knees when those onboard saw the lights of Coast Guard responders.

"Everybody was suiting up with life jackets because we knew the boat was eventually going to go under," Mertz said.

The occupants pulled a cord on a lifeboat to inflate it and got into the water. Coast Guard officials aboard a 25-foot response boat and a 47-foot motor lifeboat were unable to get close enough to the fishing boat because of the rocks, Mertz said, so the six climbed from the "Southern Comfort" onto the inflatable lifeboat to make their way to a Coast Guard craft.

'Relaxing day' thwarted

Mertz hadn't been deep-sea fishing in 20 years, after an outing off Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He got the chance to go out today through his job as national construction manager at Northampton-based LVR Inc., a maker of heat-resistant products, called refractories, and industrial insulation. Three men with an LVR subcontractor, Export, Pa.-based KT-Grant Inc., invited Mertz to join them.

"Today was going to be a relaxing day," said Mertz, who is married with two children and a stepson. "As you can see, we didn't make it."

Emergency medical personnel waiting on shore checked out Mertz; Stork; the first mate, Dennis R. Koleszar, also of Forked River; and KT-Grant employees Bill Sagion, of Little Egg Harbor, N.J.; Albert Kristoff, of Glenshaw, Pa., and John Wargofchik from Greensburg, Pa.

Stork did not immediately return a call for comment on the incident.

Chief Warrant Officer Jay Greiner, the commanding officer of the Barnegat Light station, praised the captain for marking sure to brief all those aboard before leaving dock on where the safety gear was located and how to use it.

Following the rescue, the fishing boat floated off the jetty and sank, the Coast Guard reports.

According to the Coast Guard, a crew aboard a 24-foot boat responded to maintain a security zone around the area while salvage plans are made. The vessel is not reported to be a hazard to navigation.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.