On todays UM I tuned in too late and caught the ending of a story about a man and his 3 sons as well as another man have vanished and supposedly on a boat. The mens wives deny these guys would ever have left and also there was no update? AGH! Can anyone provide a link to the story or clue me in on what the story is? Thanks:)

The story line was basically this. A father who had recently moved to Colombia w. a new girlfriend/wife came back to the US, Oregon I believe, to take his children, 3 boys, and their dog on a fishing trip for 3 days. The youngest of the children only 6. They left around dawn that morning, and set out to the North Pacific, with another experianced shrimper. Within 24 hours the boat was missing. The ship was equiped w. radio equiptment so theres a question as to why there was no radio contact if there was trouble. There were thoughts that the father, since recently moving to Colombia, had kidnapped the children and fled to back to Colombia. But the wife of the second adult, the experianced shrimper, said that her husband had no reason to disappear, no reason to flee. As he had young children of his own.
Later that year a fishing boat was dragging their net in and hooked something 700 feet down in the same area the 5 people and dog had disappeared. This happened twice. On the second snag, they pulled up a shrimping net, which was confirmed to belong to the Father of the children. As the man who sold it to him inspected it and concluded it was the one he sold. Because the waters are so cold in that area, and so unpredictable, there has been no underwater search of the area where the fisherman snagged something. The area was searched shortly after the disappearance, by the marine patrol and nothing, not wreckage, nor an oil slick were found.
I hope you could follow along with that! If I left anything of importance out, please everyone feel free to stick it in!:wave:

Wow! Thank you sooo much! You certainly are good with details. In the little that I DID see, i was very amused by this odd case, esp. since there are FIVE people missing and none have resurfaced. By any chance, did UM ha[ppen to mention how in depth the police have checked into the new wife in Columbia? Maybe she was told to lay low for awhile...??? It would be interesting to see her re-interviewed now after all these years. Thanks again!

Hi,
Glad to hear you could understand my rehashing of the story. I wondered the VERY same thing, about the wife in Colombia. But they didnt even mention if they had spoken to her or not. I would have to hope that they (meaning the fbi, police...) would have interviewed her. But then again, lol who knows!

Im sorry I cant recall the names, but if you happen upon them Id love to hear what you find out.

:wave:

Originally posted by SJP1313


Im sorry I cant recall the names, but if you happen upon them Id love to hear what you find out.


I remember this story too. As far as names go I only remember one. The youngest boys name was Caleb.

My heart just went out to this woman who lost her three boys and had no way of knowing what really happened to them. She said she was a little worried about her youngest son going on the trip...he was only six...but she thought he would be okay. She even gave him instructions on how to be safe on the boat and helped him pack his suitcase. He wanted to pack all of his clothes but she told him he didn't need to take everything because he wasn't going to be gone very long.

The name of the fisherman who brought his sons on the trip was Red Straight. They said he had planned on starting a second family with his new wife and his ex-wife doubted he would take the boys because he was welcome to see them whenever he wanted plus the other fisherman that went had a wife and family at home. They also said before they went missing someone had radioed them and said a barge was coming their way and they said ok to the message. They went on to say if a barge that big would have hit their small boat the barge probably wouldn't even have noticed. I think thats probably the most likely scenario of what happened.

I too thought that would be the most likely scenario. BUT one of the interviewed fisherman,...boat operators said the reason he doubted this scenario was what I mentioned in the afore posted message, there was no oil slick on top of the water. If a large barge had hit this small boat, theres no doubt that the oil/gas tank of the small ship would have burst. The other reason they doubted this scenario is because there was NO wreckage. A large barge hitting a small boat would destroy it, and as the last message stated wouldnt even know they hit it. Therefore creating a large debri feild. Eventually drifting ashore, and through out the oceans surface.

My thought would be that they encountered problems sometime during the night and either sank, and went down with the ship, or sank while asleep and had no time to react therefore the father and other gentlemen would be stuck trying to save not only themselves but the children and dog. Sinking while they were awake and aware of what was happening would explain why there was no life vests found, because they would have been wearing them. This would also explain why there was no debri found. Typically on a boat things are put in an under-hatch type of compartment which closes and locks, so as to make more room on this small boat.

Those are just some thoughts. Who really knows what happened. We will never know for sure.

:confused:

Crystaldawn, thank you for providing a name for us. I suppose anyone's theory is plausible at this point but I wonder if there was any info jotted down when the warning call about the barge was sent? Wouldnt it then seem logical to search those waters with radar? Why on Earth have they found nothing, zip, zilch of debris? I guess this is why it makes it such the perfect Unsolved Mystery.

P.S. what I meant by jotting down info is the location at the time of them passing the barge.