BY SAM DESMOND, MARIANA DOMINGUEZ
A missing passenger who had fallen into the water following a crash early Monday morning when a boat struck a jetty in the Brown's River Corridor in the Great South Bay was found approximately 1:30 p.m. Tuesday by Suffolk Marine Bureau, said Sayville Ferry president Ken Stein.
Police identified the passenger as 25 year-old Nelson Matos.
The operator and another passenger had been transported to the hospital with injuries when the boat hit the jetty at 1:23 a.m. on Monday.
Jack Benjamin, of Farmingville, was operating a 2003 Parker center console boat in the Great South Bay when the vessel struck a jetty at the end of Browns River Road at 1:23 a.m.
A 25-year-old male passenger, since identified as Matos, who was not wearing a life jacket, was thrown overboard. Suffolk County Police officers, personnel from multiple fire departments and the United States Coast Guard conducted a search for the man. Marine Bureau officers were involved with the search.
Benjamin and a female passenger were transported to South Shore University Hospital in Bay Shore where they were treated and released. Three other passengers were not injured.
Benjamin, 25, of 1021 Old Medford Ave., Farmingville, was charged with Boating While Intoxicated. He was held at the Fifth Precinct and was arraigned at First District Court in Central Islip on July 6. He pled not guilty. Bail was set.
The boat was impounded.
A ferry boat from Sayville Ferry Service was on the scene and crew members helped with the initial search for the missing boater using their spotlight. A ferry worker on a regularly scheduled boat witnessed the accident and alerted the ferry captain en route to docking on Brown's River. “Given the man overboard and other emergency training that we undergo, myself and the crew members were thoroughly prepared to rescue people if need be,” said Zach Stephan, a captain at Sayville Ferry Service since 2013 who was the manager on duty who took the ferry boat out to assist in the search.
Stein explained the process staff proceed with in such circumstances. “When that situation occurred the crew do two things. One; they alert the office and the manager on duty and then two they make a call to the Suffolk County Marine Bureau or 911 and to the Coast Guard.
“They went out right away prepared to do a man overboard. Of course, at that point, they were hoping they were going to do a man overboard save. So, they were looking for someone who may have been hurt or just floating and that they would be able to grab.”
When several people went flying overboard in 2002; Stein’s crew was able to rescue them. “We’ve done that,” Stein said. “We have a Coast Guard proclamation that was given to my staff in 2002. A boat was going out of the jetty when another boat hit the jetty and three people went flying into the water and they were there to pull them out right away, preventing a tragedy. This time they went out to do the same thing and searched for quite a long time but to no avail.”
Stein said incidents do happen. “We get rock versus rock pile, seems to be an average of between one to every two or every three years,” he said. “Sometimes it can be nothing, just a bump. Sometimes, there are serious injuries and there have been deaths. Sadly, it happens a lot more often than not. And of course, close calls we’ll never even know those.”
