In the overnight hours of a mild June morning, a caller told the Coast Guard the crew was abandoning ship in Sandy Hook Bay because their sailboat was taking on water.
Coast Guard rescuers from the Sandy Hook station sped to the location. A helicopter and rescue aircraft from the federal agency deployed from Atlantic City and Massachusetts. A state police helicopter assisted.
The end result: no boat, no sailors and an $88,000 Coast Guard price tag.
Hoax distress calls have always been a frustrating part of the Coast Guard's job, putting rescuers and other boaters with possible emergencies in unnecessary danger. But it's taxpayers who must foot the bill for those responses.
Since 2008, the agency received 211 of what it officially labels "uncorrelated mayday" and probable hoax calls for an area that includes New Jersey, New York City and the Hudson River. And with a few more weeks left in the boating season, more could occur.
"It's a bad economy, everybody's hurting and this makes it worse," said Petty Officer 1st Class Dan Blouch of Coast Guard Station Sandy Hook.
"It goes beyond frustration," added Chief Warrant Officer Brandon S. Brewer, commanding officer, Public Affairs Detachment New York. "It's us potentially putting our crews at risk when there's not really a distress call. And that coupled with the fact that God forbid there is a real distress call at the same time, our resources will be tied up searching for someone who's not there."
In the region that encompasses northern New Jersey, New York City and the Hudson River, the calls spiked from 35 in fiscal 2008 to 55 in 2009. But they dropped to 36 in fiscal 2011, which ends Friday.
Calls in the coverage area of Sandy Hook to Cape May gradually climbed from six in fiscal 2008 to 11 in 2010 with 10 reported so far in 2011, according to agency statistics.
"There's no rhyme or reason to an increase or decrease, but it's dangerous and it's expensive no matter what — whether it's one or 100," said Charles Rowe, public affairs officer for Coast Guard Sector New York.
On average, several thousand dollars is expended every time rescue crews respond to a suspected hoax call. For example, an 87-foot patrol boat dispatched to a scene costs $3,667 per hour while a helicopter out of Atlantic City costs $11,078 per hour.
When a distress call is received, the Coast Guard always responds with radio communications or by launching a rescue boat or helicopter, said Commander Stacey Mersel, chief of the command center for Coast Guard Sector New York.
"When we get the call, we never assume it's a hoax," she said. "We think it's the real deal. The goal is to save a life."
Dispatchers are also assisted by relatively new direction-detection technology called Rescue 21 that more accurately locates radio distress signals and narrows a search area.
The nature of suspected hoax calls vary with some consisting of only one word such as "Mayday" or "Emergency" before the connection is lost. Others have been made by unsupervised children using the radio on their parents' boats or intoxicated boaters playing practical jokes.
Rescue officials speculate that fake distress calls are sometimes made because the offenders are seeking attention or want to feel powerful.
"It's very frustrating because you're out there searching for hours and you don't find anybody and you don't know if it's a hoax," said Blouch during a patrol of the Sandy Hook area this summer.
In the June 14 incident in Sandy Hook Bay, the Coast Guard spent nearly $88,000 during the 600-square-mile search for the Courtney Lynn crew after receiving two distress calls. The first claimed the 33-foot sailboat was taking on water. The second, 20 minutes later, reported the four crew members were transferring to a small gray dinghy because the vessel was sinking.
Federal officials were told the crew didn't have a hand-held radio, flares or a sound-producing device.
Officers later determined the transmissions were false distress calls and the case remains under investigation. A $1,000 reward has been offered for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of the person who wasted the rescuers' time.
The difficulty of finding the hoax caller depends on the circumstances of the case, said Bill Hicks, special agent in charge for the Coast Guard Investigative Service's Mid-Atlantic region.
"Sometimes it's very difficult because there are hundreds of places where people could facilitate the call from," he said. "Sometimes it's easy because people tell you what their name, phone number and address are."
The investigative service, which has units scattered throughout the country, turn the cases over to the U.S. Attorney's Office for prosecution. Offenders who make false distress calls face hefty punishment including a maximum five to 10 years in prison, a $250,000 fine, an $8,000 civil penalty and possible reimbursement.
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