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Crew members of the 40-foot sport fishing boat activated their Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB) from approximately 69 miles off the coast of Cape May around 1:20 p.m., the Coast Guard said in a statement.
A small craft advisory for the area indicated 4-to-6-foot seas with winds gusting up to 30 knots.
Coast Guard crews aboard an MH-60 Jayhawk and an HC-130 Hercules aircraft from Air Station Elizabeth City, North Carolina, and a 47-foot Motor Life Boat from Station Indian River were launched to assist.
All seven people were hoisted and taken to Coast Guard Air Station Elizabeth City where local EMS was standing by to assist.
“One of the scariest and most unpredictable places you can be is out on the water in a storm,” said Petty Officer 1st Class Christopher Petrenko, an operations specialist with the Sector Delaware Bay command center.
“Fortunately, they had life jackets, a registered EPIRB and a radio, which they used to call for help. If any one of those pieces had been missing, we might not have been as successful as we were.”
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