Coast Guard Blames Korean Freighter for Fatal Yacht Accident

In a report filled with vivid details of disaster on the high seas, the U.S. Coast Guard said Friday that a South Korean freighter was responsible for ramming and sinking a Santa Clarita family’s yacht last fall in the South Pacific, killing two children and their father.

Concluding an investigation that also involved maritime safety experts in New Zealand and South Korean police, the Coast Guard said the 27,000-ton log carrier was the “proximate cause” of the sinking of the 47-foot Melinda Lee on Nov. 24 off New Zealand’s North Island.

In stormy seas and in the middle of the night, the Coast Guard said in a report obtained by The Times, the Pan Grace apparently failed to detect the Melinda Lee on radar. Nevertheless, just before impact, crewmen aboard the massive freighter saw a red light off its starboard bow--a sign that another vessel was nearby.

But, the Coast Guard said, the freighter’s officer of the watch failed to slow down and turn away from the Melinda Lee--steps he should have taken immediately under internationally recognized “rules of the road” at sea.

Killed were Michael Sleavin, 42, Benjamin, 9, and Anna, 7. Judith Ann Sleavin, 41, the sole survivor, washed ashore after clinging to a dinghy for 42 hours. The Melinda Lee had been en route from Tonga to New Zealand as part of an around-the-world sailing adventure.

Investigators in South Korea, New Zealand and the United States have long suspected the Pan Grace in the accident.

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Earlier this month, in fact, South Korean police said the freighter was at fault after finding that streaks of blue paint on the freighter’s orange hull matched the blue paint on the yacht’s hull. They added, according to an Associated Press dispatch, that the watch officer that night--Second Mate Han Sang-Yoon, 26--faced possible criminal charges.

The Coast Guard report, however, sets forth new details of the crash:

On a rainy night, the 14-ton Melinda Lee was plowing along under sail at 5 or 6 knots.

Judith Sleavin had taken the watch at 1 a.m.; the others were sleeping.

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Apparently because of the heavy weather, the Sleavins were not maintaining a lookout--which the Coast Guard recommends at all times but especially during a storm.

The Pan Grace was manning a lookout but on the bridge, the Coast Guard said. Under international rules, according to the Coast Guard, a proper lookout in heavy weather and traffic would include a crew member farther forward.

At 2:12 a.m., as waves surged to 12 feet and winds raged to 35 knots, the Pan Grace--running at 9 knots--smashed into the yacht’s port side and spun it around, the Coast Guard said. The yacht rolled over and sank within minutes.

Benjamin, who had been asleep in a bunk below, went down with the yacht. His younger sister and parents scrambled to a rubber dinghy. The sea was so rough it kept pitching them out of the dinghy, however, so they turned it over and held onto a rope lashed to the craft. After holding on for eight hours, Anna let go, and her father plunged after her. About 20 hours after she washed ashore, Judith Sleavin was seen and rescued.

No one on the Pan Grace saw, heard or felt the crash, the Coast Guard said.