2 rescued in lifeboat after US-flagged charter sailboat sinks off Puerto Rico

Coast Guard rescues 2 from sinking boat in PR

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — The U.S. Coast Guard has rescued two people found floating in a life raft after their sailboat sank off Puerto Rico.

A Coast Guard spokesman says the two people were sailing the 48-foot (14-meter) “Victoria” from St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands to Panama when the vessel struck a submerged object and began taking on water. The sinking happened Saturday about 100 miles (160 kilometers) southwest of Puerto Rico.

Spokesman Ricardo Castrodad says the Coast Guard received a distress signal and began searching for the couple, an Austrian man and woman from Mexico. A helicopter crew spotted them and airlifted them to safety in Puerto Rico.