JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The captain of the doomed freighter El Faro said in his final call for help that the “clock is ticking” as his ship took on water and lost propulsion.
Part of Capt. Michael Davidson’s call was played Saturday during a U.S. Coast Guard investigative hearing into the Oct. 1 sinking. All 33 aboard died when the ship sank in 15,000 feet of water near the Bahamas during Hurricane Joaquin.
Family members of lost El Faro crew members looked on as the crackly audio played to the quiet room.
Davidson called the emergency operations center just after 7 a.m. the day the El Faro sank. He’d left a message minutes earlier with a company official, whom he couldn’t reach, saying the ship had a “pretty good list,” or was tipping, but that people were safe.
“We had a hull breach, a scuttle blew open during a storm,” Davidson told an operator in a follow-up call minutes later, his voice calm but urgent. “We have water down in three holds with a heavy list. We’ve lost the main propulsion unit, the engineers cannot get it going.”
The operator asked the captain for his satellite phone number and to spell the name of the vessel, at which point Davidson sounded frustrated, saying “the clock is ticking” and that he needed to speak to a company official. He can also be heard calling to crew members to ask what they’re seeing down below.
The call was sent to Capt. John Lawrence, the designated person onshore for Tote Services Inc. He said Davidson sounded calm, and planned to “push all the buttons” or activate his emergency beacons.
After an unsuccessful attempt to reach the ship again, Lawrence called the U.S. Coast Guard. In the call, neither Lawrence nor the Coast Guard officer mention Hurricane Joaquin, which had become a Category 4 storm.
