Whale-watching company said engine overheating was cause of need for Coast Guard rescue

MONTEREY, Calif. (KION-TV)- The U.S Coast Guard and Monterey Fire Department responded to reports of a potential fire on board a 50-foot whale-watching vessel off Point Pinos on Sunday.

The Coast Guard said that the Pacifica had 43 people aboard. At around, 10 a.m., Coast Guard Sector San Francisco watchstanders received a report from the Master of the Pacifica that the engine room's fire alarm was going off and they could see smoke.

The master said he was returning to port and asked for assistance from the Coast Guard. Discovery Whale Watch confirmed it was their vessel that had to be rescued by the Coast Guard.

"A Station Monterey 47-foot Motor Life Boat crew put the disabled Pacifica in tow and brought it back to Monterey," said the Coast Guard.

The cause of this incident is still under investigation. There were no reported injuries, said officials.

As far as that situation, the co-owner of discovery whale watch spoke to KION about what went down and how everyone made sure it wasn’t as bad as it was perceived to be. 

John Mayers, co-owner of Discovery Whale Watch said “an engine overheated. And the paint that was on the exhaust manifold where it got hot created smoke. And so in that situation, a good captain like the captain that was driving the boat yesterday, they're going to take it seriously, you know, and I treat it like it is a fire.” 

The captain made sure that everyone stayed away from the smoke and wait for responders to arrive to bring them back here to the wharf. Although this could be a scary situation, everyone was actually calm through the whole process.

“Everybody was actually kind of laughing and joking and so on," said Mayer. "The boat came in, you know, earlier you were wearing the life jackets saying, hey, look good at orange, you know, and everybody was a happy lot. Overall, everybody was very, very cordial and cool and calm. There was no panic or anything like that. Nothing close to that scenario.”

The coast guard will monitor the repairs on the boat.

Levi Read, Chief Public Affairs Specialist, U.S. Coast Guard District 11 said “We will…coast guard will certainly monitor any passenger vessel and they will have to go through inspections before they are allowed to take people out again, specific to that vessel.” 

Although they say the situation is bad timing, discovery says they’re confident they’ll get the boat back up and go through all the systems to make sure it’s ready to go.