Boat capsize off Urunga leaves man and teen adrift battling huge waves and strong ocean currents

A man and a teen are “very lucky” to be alive after their fishing boat was hit by a huge wave, leaving them clinging to the upturned hull before being flung off and carried away in a strong current.

The pair were lucky to make it out alive after their boat capsized off the Mid-North Coast at Urunga and they drifted nearly 1km from the vessel before being rescued. Picture: Supplied.

A man and a teenage boy are “very lucky” to be alive after desperately making a triple-0 call while adrift in the ocean following monster surf capsizing their small fishing boat off the Mid-North Coast.

The sorry pair, aged 16 and 52, were found on a lonely stretch of beach about 800-metres north of the vessel off Urunga shortly after making the emergency call at 7.30am on Sunday.

After receiving the alert, local surf-lifesaver Tim Rodgers raced to the Urunga Bar Crossing, where the boat had set out for sea.

Mr Rodgers and partner Shane Fernie were dismayed to find there was no sign of boat or the two passengers.

“When we couldn’t see them on the beach we were expecting another outcome,” Mr Rodgers said.

“There was a six to eight-foot surf running, it was huge. They were very, very lucky.”

As Mr Rodgers and Mr Fernie set out in an Inflatable Rescue Boat they received a report the pair had made it to shore.

“It took some while to spot them and we could eventually see two fellows sitting up on the beach,” Mr Rodgers said.

The vessel being removed from the beach. Picture: Supplied.

“They were pretty shaken up. The young fellow started vomiting. I reckon they had taken on a fair bit of water.

“The old fellow didn’t look in real good nick. I think there was a lot going through his head in terms of losing his boat and everything. They were just exhausted.”

“We just said ‘Boys, I know you’ve lost your boat but you’re alive. You’ve got that to be thankful for because it could have been a very different scenario considering how big the surf was.”

Mr Rogers and Mr Fernie quickly decided it was too dangerous to go back out to sea.

“There was a high tide and the swell was so big we couldn’t put them in the boat to take them back out,” he said.

“North Beach lifesavers came down with a four-wheel drive with two paramedics and took them up there.”

NSW Ambulance said they were called to attend to the men at 7.45am and assessed them as suffering a minor scrapes and scratches that did not require hospital treatment.

The pair’s fishing boat was discovered on Mylestom Beach, some 12km north of where it capsized and “pretty trashed”, according to Mr Rodgers.

NSW Surf Lifesavers Damian Kay, Shane Fearnley and Tim Rodgers, who were involved in the Urunga rescue. Picture: Supplied.

Facebook user Ryan Woods filmed the upturned boat and later on Sunday morning also captured footage of an excavator attempting to lift it out of the sand.

Mr Rodgers said initially the rescued pair followed a smaller boat out past the Urunga river mouth and “just got hit by a wave that swamped them, turned them over”.

“They were kind of clinging onto the boat for a while but the surf was so big they just couldn’t hang on,” he said.

“They just sort of sat in the current which was running parallel to the beach. They managed to get themselves ashore

“They both had life-jackets on, thank God, they would have been dead for sure if they weren’t wearing life jackets.”

The older man also fortunately had his mobile phone in a waterproof case.

“He gave his phone to the young fellow because he was really struggling in the water,” Mr Rodgers said.

“The young fellow was talking to the triple-0 operator trying to stay on the line that’s how we got the little bit of information they were on the beach.”

The bedraggled pair were both visitors to the region with the older man coming from Maxwell, near Wagga Wagga in the southwest of NSW, and the teenager hailing from Newcastle on the Central Coast.

Mr Rodgers said the pair’s expedition was ill-advised from the get-go.

“My mate and I who picked him up were planning to out from the bar fishing but there was a hazardous surf warning issued,” he said.

“Just check your warnings, check your conditions. It is hard enough for locals to go across that bar because it is so sketchy.

“For people who don’t live here and don’t look at regularly to see how it changes and where you should be going out there you take a big risk.

“Use common sense. It was a solid surf running. We just couldn’t believe anyone would take it on really.”

Originally published as Boat capsize off Urunga leaves man and teen adrift battling huge waves and strong ocean currents