Trawler sinks off Cape May; 2 dead, 4 missing

Two men are dead and four others missing after a fishing vessel sank about 70 miles southeast of Cape May this morning, the U.S. Coast Guard reported.

A rescue helicopter plucked three men from the ocean after they were spotted floating near an empty life raft, officials said.

One was dead and another was unresponsive and died this afternoon. The third told the Coast Guard that the 71-foot Lady Mary, a scalloper, based in Cape May sank around 5 a.m.

There were seven people on board, he told the Coast Guard.

Two Coast Guard cutters, a C-130 aircraft and two helicopters are searching for survivors.

Relatives of the crew gathered this afternoon on the fishing boat dock at the Lobster Trap on Cape May Harbor, to await news, comfort each other and pray.

One fisherman said the Lady Mary had been out at sea for about a week and had been due home any day now.

Video of the rescue helicopter arriving back in Atlantic City shows one survivor walking in a red full-body survival suit. Also in the video, another man in a survival suit is loaded into the back of an ambulance.

The Coast Guard was alerted to an unregistered emergency beacon at 7:30 a.m. and dispatched a helicopter from Atlantic City, which reached the men at 8:30 a.m., said Petty Officer Nathan Henise.

Waves were 4 to 7 feet high when the boat sank. The water temperature was 40 degrees and the air temperature 33 - conditions that would rapidly kill anyone without a survival suit, officials said.

The fishing vessel is the second in a week to run into trouble in the waters off Cape May.

On March 17, a Good Samaritan scalloper rescued three members of the North Carolina-based Miss Dollie who had abandoned ship shortly before it exploded in flames 30 miles out at sea.