The State - News from March 4, 1985

After sighting one body from a sunken tugboat, the Coast Guard searched in rough seas off the Northern California coast for five other missing crew members who might be alive because they had survival suits, officials said. The crew of the tugboat Willamette Pilot III told authorities that they were donning their rubberized survival suits--a kind of super-insulated wet suit--when they radioed that the boat was sinking. The 7-year-old, 115-foot Willamette sank after it went out to recover a 365-foot barge that had broken free from another tug, the Pacific Challenge, the Coast Guard said. The reason for the sinking was still under investigation.