Ships Race to Rescue 10 on Life Raft in Hurricane : Storm: Planes hover over crew of San Pedro-based fishing vessel to direct surface ships to scene. Crew of a yacht had been pulled earlier from same heavy seas.

A Coast Guard cutter from San Diego and other ships and aircraft were trying late Monday to help the stranded crew of a San Pedro-based fishing vessel caught in Hurricane Darby off the Mexican coast, the Coast Guard said.

Earlier Monday, the Coast Guard helped rescue another crew caught in the same storm while en route to Newport Beach, said Lt. John Davis of the Coast Guard operations center in Long Beach. That crew was headed to Port Hueneme on a merchant vessel that had picked them up Monday afternoon.

The storm appeared to be moving away from the 10-member crew of the San Pedro boat, the 60-foot fishing vessel Tutor. They had abandoned the craft and were bobbing on a life raft.

The crew, which had radioed at 7 p.m. Sunday that they were caught in 100-m.p.h. winds and 25-foot swells, was without radio contact in the raft. But three Coast Guard C-130s from Sacramento and a Navy P-3 airplane from Moffet Field took turns flying over the life raft while four ships headed toward it, about 150 miles west of Cabo San Lucas.

The stranded crew was too far offshore for a helicopter to get close enough to lift them to safety, Davis said.

The nearest of the four vessels, the merchant ship Lakambini, was about 150 miles away Monday evening and was not expected to get to the life raft until sometime today, Davis said. Meanwhile, one plane would remain overhead, he said. The planes took turns watching the life raft, refueling in La Paz, Mexico, he said.

The other three ships included two Mexican naval vessels and the Coast Guard cutter Morganthau, dispatched from San Diego on Monday afternoon.

It was not known whether any of the 10 people aboard the raft were injured, Davis said.

The airplane crews overhead said the Tutor was still afloat late Monday, though it had lost its pilot house windows and rudder.

On Monday evening, winds were measured at about 58 m.p.h. and swells were 15 to 20 feet, Davis said. The hurricane was moving away from that area.

But Davis cautioned, “We’re having trouble with the weather conditions. It’s really tiring for the flight crews.”

One of the C-130s involved in the Tutor rescue attempt had flown over the other stranded crew that was eventually rescued Monday.

The yacht Oasis, which had been headed to Newport Beach from Florida, reported Sunday that it was caught in 90-m.p.h. winds and 25-foot seas 120 miles southwest of Cabo San Lucas.

Seven people were aboard the 70-foot yacht, which lost one engine due to fire and two pilot house windows.

The merchant vessel Chiquita Roma, out of the Bahamas, was the first ship to reach that scene about 12:45 p.m. Monday. It rescued the crew, one of whom might have suffered a broken arm, Davis said.

The Chiquita Roma was expected to reach Port Hueneme on Wednesday.