Search Picks Up Again After "Every Boater's Nightmare"
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CHICAGO (CBS) -- Crews were out searching Lake Michigan again Tuesday morning for two boaters who have been missing since their boat caught fire and sunk in frigid water on Saturday night.
The boat left Burnham Harbor on Saturday and stopped in New Buffalo, Michigan, before heading back to Chicago, when a fire apparently started onboard about 7 miles off 31st Street Harbor around 7 p.m.. Four people were on the boat when it capsized.
"Every boater's nightmare is being out there in the dark, and have that happen," said one boater who was at 31st Street Harbor on Tuesday as the Chicago Police Marine Unit searched for two boaters still missing three days after the boat sank.
One man was rescued from the lake Sunday morning, about 11 hours after the boat started to sink, when the captain of a charter fishing boat spotted him in the water. That man was taken to Mercy Hospital & Medical Center to be treated for hypothermia, having spent the night in 60 degree water.
A couple hours after that man was found, rescue crews found a woman from the boat in the water, but she died after she was taken to Mercy Hospital.
Ashley Haws, 26, worked as an attorney for a Chicago family law firm. She grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin and graduated from Valparaiso University law school two years ago.
"She just was a wonderful, wonderful person. Very caring, very passionate, very family-oriented; loved kids. That's why she was in family law. She loved her job, loved living in Chicago," said her grandmother, Shirley Haws.
The U.S. Coast Guard on Monday suspended its search for the two remaining boaters, who are believed to have donned their lifejackets before going in the water, but are presumed dead after spending more than three days in the frigid lake.
The Chicago Police Marine Unit continued its own search for the two missing boaters, a 27-year-old woman and a 30-year-old man. Haws is the only person from the boat whose name has been released.
