Digital Bulletin

01:00 AM EDT on Saturday, May 8, 2004

TIVERTON (AP) -- Shivering with cold, his feet cut and bleeding, 14-year-old Christopher Duarte stood at the Roses' front door about 1 a.m. today, saying his family had been involved in a boating accident, and he needed help.

The teenager, barefoot and wearing a T-shirt and shorts, told Dave and Karen Rose that he'd been fighting the current, as he swam to shore for what seemed like nearly two hours. The last time he saw his mother, the boy said, she was clinging to a fender on the boat, without a life jacket.

"He kept saying, 'There's been an accident. I swam to shore. I'm sure the boat sank by now,"' Karen Rose told The Associated Press.

Duarte's mother was among three people who died when a small pleasure boat carrying six people capsized in Mount Hope Bay during the night. A fourth person, Duarte's aunt, remains missing. Duarte's father, 35-year-old Allen Duarte, was rescued and was in critical condition in a hospital.

At 5:20 p.m., more than 12 hours into its rescue mission, the Coast Guard called off its active search for the boy's aunt, 24-year-old Kelleigh Ouellette, Petty Officer Michael Caianiello said. The search was suspended when the Coast Guard determined weather and water conditions made it unlikely that the woman had survived, Caianiello said.

The dead included the boy's mother, Edwina Duarte, 34; the boy's cousin, James Duarte, 23; and the aunt's boyfriend, Richard Doehler, 39. All of the boat's passengers were from Fall River, Mass.

"This is a family excursion that went awry, and it's a tragedy," Blakey said.

Petty Officer Andrew Shinn said of the three remaining victims, two were found in the water and a third was recovered on shore. He said Edwina Duarte was still alive when she was found, but died on the way to the hospital.

Officials said a change in the weather might have contributed to the accident. Others said there may have been too many people on the 17-foot speedboat.

"The weather had changed. Winds had picked up," Blakey said. Earlier, he told The AP: "I'm sure weather conditions were a factor. ... We're looking at weather, equipment, human error. Everything."

The group had gone out in the boat, which had an open frame and an 85 horsepower motor, during the day Friday, and had traveled to a relative's waterfront home in Swansea, Mass. The group left Swansea after dark and was heading to a dock in Fall River when the boat capsized, Blakey said.

Skies were clear and temperatures were in the upper 50s to low 60s. But the wind had been picking up throughout the evening. By midnight, it was blowing from the north at 21 miles per hour, with gusts up to 30 mph.

She was wearing a T-shirt and jeans when she fell into the 50-degree water, said Coast Guard Capt. Judy Keene.

"For a normal person (to survive), we're probably past that point," Keene said early today afternoon.

Blakey said the boy was wearing a floatation device and probably wasn't in the water for as long as it seemed. Duarte shed the life jacket after he made it ashore, and walked on a shell-covered beach and through briars before he found the Roses' home and frantically banged on the door, Dave Rose said.

Dave Rose called Tiverton police. About 20 minutes later, authorities found the boy's father, who was suffering from hypothermia. He was in critical condition on today at a local hospital.

"The quick response probably saved this guy," Blakey said.

The Roses said they covered Christopher Duarte with blankets. Over and over, they said, he described how he kept himself alive. He remembered a story his grandfather, a shellfisherman, told about his own boat capsizing.

"He said he kept thinking about what his grandfather told him, 'Don't give up. Keep surviving,"' Dave Rose said.

"I would say it's nothing short of a miracle he was able to do that," Rose added.

Authorities were investigating precisely where the boat capsized, and when. Blakey said the vessel capsized between Fall River and Tiverton, near the point where Mount Hope Bay meets the Sakonnet River, which extends to the south. Mount Hope Bay is a lobe of Narragansett Bay, with shoreline in Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

The current pulled everyone, including the boat, south around the Sakonnet River Bridge, Keene said. The boy reached shore on the bay's east side, about two miles north of the bridge. The boat was recovered farther south -- about a third of a mile north of the bridge.

Victims' bodies were found both to the north and south of the bridge.

As the Coast Guard searched with a helicopter and state and local authorities searched by water and on foot along the shore, Mike Frederick and other family friends conducted their own search for Ouellette.

Frederick, Doehler's cousin, said that Doehler and Ouellette had been living together for about a year. Doehler was a mechanic in Fall River, but his real passion was boats, said the 46-year-old Frederick, of Fall River.

Frederick said Doehler had a teenage son, and Ouellette has two boys of her own.

Some questioned why the family would be on the water in winterlike conditions, and said the boat may have been overcrowded.

"People don't heed weather warnings," said Don Dettlinger, an assistant harbor master for Tiverton. "It's risky. Why those people were out there last night is beyond my belief. I wouldn't be out if I were on my boat."

AP-ES-05-08-04 1818EDT