Scuba Diver Missing Off Anacapa

A 45-year-old Orange County man who disappeared off Anacapa Island while scuba diving Sunday morning had not been found by shortly after sunset, when the U.S. Coast Guard called off the search, officials said.

The Coast Guard is expected to resume the search at first light this morning.

The man, whose name was not released, was among 22 divers aboard the Explorer, a charter diving boat that had departed from Ventura Harbor at 7 a.m. Rescue divers from the Explorer crew worked with the Coast Guard during the search.

The missing man, described as an experienced diver, was a member of a Los Angeles diving club that had chartered the boat for the day.

Around 10:30 a.m., the crew realized the man had not resurfaced after a dive near the coral reef off the island coast.

“He just never came up,” said Herb Tover, the Explorer’s dive master. “It happens sometimes. You don’t want it to happen, but we’re trying to deal with it.”

By noon, the Coast Guard had sent a helicopter, an airplane and a surface vessel to search around the island 11 miles off the coast of Ventura.

Coast Guard officials said they have no idea why the man disappeared. But they said fellow diving club members told them the missing man liked to dive alone and was by himself during Sunday’s dive.

Several certified rescue divers aboard the Explorer conducted an unsuccessful daylong search for the man Sunday. The vessel returned to Ventura Harbor about 4:10 p.m.

Sunday was an ideal day to dive because the ocean was so calm, said Glenn Morgan of Long Beach, one of the passengers aboard the Explorer. He said he did not know the missing man.

Other divers have disappeared off the Channel Islands in recent years. In August, a 53-year-old Santa Barbara man drowned while diving for sea urchins off Santa Rosa Island. Authorities speculated that Elwin O. Swint Jr.’s air line had been severed by a sailboat.

In 1997, a 44-year-old Redding woman, who was known as an experienced diver, drowned near Santa Cruz Island when her air tank ran low.