The Tribune

By DENISE MAYCOCK

Tribune Freeport Reporter

dmaycock@tribunemedia.net

US Coast Guard officials have covered over 5,000 square miles searching for a Florida woman presumed to have fallen overboard from a private catamaran in waters near Cay Sal in the northern Bahamas.

Isabella Hellman, 41, and her husband, Lewis Bennett, had left Cuba around 5.30pm on Sunday onboard their 37ft catamaran, ‘Surf into Summer’. The vacationing couple was heading back home to South Florida when their vessel reportedly struck an unknown object and started taking on water around 1am on Monday.

Mr Bennett, who was rescued a short time later from a life raft, told rescuers he left his Realtor wife at the helm while he went to retire below deck around 8pm.

US Coast Guard press liaison officer Jonathan Lally told The Tribune that the incident happened 30 miles west of Cay Sal, in the Florida Straits.

He reported that rescue crews have covered 5,260 square miles in their search for Mrs Hellman, a newly married wife and mother of a 9-month-old infant, who is still missing at sea.

Asked whether she might have been able to swim and find refuge on a nearby cay, Mr Lally said they are not sure.

“We don’t know if there are any cays she can swim to, and we don’t know at what point she may have fallen off the vessel,” he said.

According to Mr Lally, the Coast Guard was initially alerted to the incident from an emergency position indicating radio beacon (EPIRB) around 1.30am Monday.

“The EPIRB sent out 406mhz signal, and we also got personal location beacon (POB) as well. Our watch centre in the 7th Coast Guard District Command Centre in Miami also received a call from international emergency response coordination centre saying they talked to Lewis Bennett, the owner of the 37ft catamaran ‘Surf into Summer’,” he said.

“They got notification from him that he struck some unknown object and his vessel was taking on water, and that he was getting ready to abandon ship.”

The Coast Guard dispatched a Dolphin aircraft which spotted the life raft and a helicopter was called in to rescue Mr Bennett.

“He informed us that they left Havana at 5.30pm on Sunday evening and he went down below 8pm on Sunday and his wife Isabella Hellman was at the helm at the time when he went down below.

“And that was the last he saw of her. He woke up to the vessel striking some unknown object and noticed it was taking on water at a rapid rate. He came topside and did not see his wife and got into the life raft.”

Mr Lally said the catamaran sank.

Although Mrs Hellman has been missing for two days at sea, he said that one factor they can never account for is someone’s will to live.

“Every search and rescue is different. There are a variety of factors that we take into consideration when we search for someone and every case is different. We account for the weather, current, and sea state, but one factor we can never account for is someone’s will to live.

“When we go out it is always our hope when we are searching for someone we find them alive and bring them safely back to their families,” said Mr Lally, who paused for a brief moment.

“ . . . If there is hope we will be out there searching,” he said.

Cay Sal lies about 100 miles southeast of Key West, Florida.

The couple was on a two-week vacation.