Forty-six people abandoned a sinking fishing vessel Tuesday shortly before noon and were rescued by merchant ships that responded to a U.S. Coast Guard emergency broadcast, an official said. The 229-foot trawler Alaska Juris was taking on water Tuesday evening in the Bering Sea, said Lt. Joseph Schlosser of the Coast Guard District 17 command center in Juneau. The boats occupants, all 46, were equipped with survival suits and abandoned ship in three life rafts, he said.
Alaska Juris was dead in the water more than 150 miles northwest of Adak, the official said.