Local News in Brief : Sailor Missing off Coast
The Coast Guard searched a wide area off the Southern California coast Thursday for a lone boater reported missing after he apparently left Santa Catalina Island for San Pedro in wind-swept, 12-foot seas on Tuesday, a spokesman said.
The San Francisco-area man, identified as Chris Dodd, was reported missing by his parents Wednesday night after he failed to catch a flight home from Los Angeles International Airport, Coast Guard spokesman Dennis Hall said. He was scheduled to board the flight after a six-hour crossing from the Avalon harbor in a 30-foot sailboat.
The seas, roughed by 50-knot winds Tuesday, would have made an otherwise routine crossing a difficult one, Hall said. Coast Guard officials also were checking to see if Dodd turned back to the island because of the rough water.
A Coast Guard airplane, a helicopter and an 82-foot cutter were searching about 1,500 square miles of sea stretching from Santa Monica to Newport Beach.
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