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A Florida man is thankful to be alive today after nearly going down with his boat Wednesday. The U.S. Coast Guard came to his rescue just in time.
Wesley Szanyi says it was rough out there. He was seasick, stranded, and out of options. Wesley says "if you would have seen me you wouldn't have believed it. I was hanging on that bow as the boat was vertical."
A photo from the rescue boat shows how rough it was out there. Szany was taking his high-performance, $75,000 speedboat out for a 60-mile-an-hour spin.
It hit a wave, lost its engine, and started taking on water. Witness Peter Hain said "the back end was dropping in and finally the bow stood straight up in the air. He was up hanging on the front of the boat as it was going down."
Szanyi was on the phone with the Coast Guard the whole time. Wesley says "The guy was walking me through on how to keep my wits and I was about ready to panic."
Ken Christian of the US Coast Guard said "he was scared, he was very relieved when he got on board."
And when he got onshore, Szanyi was shaken, bedraggled, angry, but quite alive.
Wesley says "I'm glad to be back on land."
The boat is still sitting underwater and it will cost Szanyi about $5,600 to pull it up from the ocean floor.
