Two teenagers recently brought their GoPros to a surfing spot on Central California’s coast, stoked to record gnarly footage of themselves shredding tall waves on a sunny Saturday morning.
They didn’t expect to document the aftermath of a boat capsizing, or find a family fighting for their lives.
“Oh my God, there’s a boat,” Forrest Cook, 13, yelled after a roughly 10-foot wave struck a boat about 300 feet from the shore and turned it upside down.
Six passengers, including four children, were trying to keep their heads above the roughly 57-degree water. Prolonged exposure to water below 75 degrees — without a wetsuit — can cause hypothermia. The children yelled for their mom, dad and siblings.
Cook and about a dozen other surfers paddled their boards as fast as they could to the scene that day, Feb. 7. They grabbed the passengers and placed them on their surfboards. About 15 minutes later, boats from the Santa Cruz Harbor Patrol picked up the passengers, who were treated for minor injuries and transported to a hospital.
The Santa Cruz Fire Department said in an incident report that the surfers helped save the passengers from a “potentially tragic incident.” The surfers told The Washington Post that they did what anyone in their positions would have done.
“These people were really in need of something,” said surfer Emilio Puhvel, 14. “They were all, like, pretty traumatized. They had been through a really scary experience. So I feel like going and helping was probably the right thing to do.”
One of the surfers closest to the capsizing was Darryl Virostko, a former professional surfer who goes by “Flea” because, when he was around 12 years old, someone said he looked like a flea riding a wave.
Virostko was swimming to the outside of a wave at Steamer Lane, a location famous for its strong surfing waves, when he saw the boat drive into the wave around 11:45 a.m. Virostko, 54, rushed over and saw four children and two adults in the water. Items from the boat also littered the area, including fishing lines, bait, boots and an Air Jordan sneaker.
Virostko grabbed a male passenger, whom Virostko said wasn’t wearing a life jacket and had wound on his head, and placed him on his seven-foot long surfboard. Another surfer placed a woman passenger on his surfboard.
The teenage surfers — Cook, Puhvel and their friend Ian Anderson — were surfing about 50 feet from the boat when they swam over. Anderson, 14, grabbed a child wearing a blue life jacket, and placed the child on his surfboard.
In the video, Puhvel asked if the child was hurt.
“I just want mommy and daddy,” the child yelled.
“Mommy and daddy are okay,” Anderson replied.
“They’ll be okay,” Puhvel added. “We’re getting you home.”
The man on Virostko’s surfboard said there were four children on board. Virostko yelled to the other surfers to ask who was helping a child. Four surfers replied.
“Hey, we have four children,” Virostko recalled telling the man. “It’s going to be fine.”
The surfers swam a few feet to a section of the water where the waves were calm. After a few minutes, they saw Santa Cruz Harbor Patrol boats heading toward them. The six passengers were placed on board.
Some of the surfers left the water shortly after — no longer in the mood to surf.
Santa Cruz Fire Chief Rob Oatey declined to identify the family on the boat.
Oatey thanked four of the surfers in-person a few days after the rescue. He told Puhvel and Anderson that they had potential as firefighters and invited them to apply to be lifeguards when they are 16 years old, the age requirement for the job.
“Let’s keep in touch,” Oatey recalled telling them, “and we’ll see in two years.”
The teenagers said they don’t know what careers they want to pursue — they just want to keep surfing.
Anderson has returned to Steamer Lane a few times since the incident, he said, but he’s always on the lookout for another boat.
“It kind of freaks me out a little bit,” Anderson said. “I’m just happy I was there and able to help.”
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