The police release their reports of the events that led to the early morning boating accident involving three college students.

01:00 AM EST on Friday, March 24, 2006

BY ARTHUR GREGG SULZBERGER
Journal Staff Writer

NARRAGANSETT -- The still morning air was warm enough for Daniel P. Donahue to be comfortable in his tie-dyed Allman Brothers T-shirt, denim shorts and sandals, as he sat in the back of a small aluminum rowboat, riding three-heavy, just inches above the 40-degree water of Narragansett Bay.

Geoffrey M. Wilkes and Fandia M. Sod Shloul, each wearing jeans, sneakers and a sweatshirt, paddled the boat around the foggy Bonnet Shores inlet near the house where the three University of Rhode Island students had been drinking and socializing with a handful of friends.

At about 2:45 a.m., after about 15 minutes on the water, the group returned to shore. As Shloul waited by the boat, Donahue and Wilkes headed back to the house to grab a bottle of liquor for their late night adventure.

Before he returned to the boat, bottle in hand, Wilkes assured a worried friend that the boat was safe.

Police reports released yesterday by the Narragansett Police Department provide the clearest picture yet of the chain of events that led to the disappearance of the three students. The reports, based in part on interviews with the friends who were with them in the hours before they disappeared on March 13, are part of a continuing investigation into the accident.

The discovery of the rowboat later that morning, partially submerged and floating in the cold Bay water, triggered one of the largest search and rescue efforts in Rhode Island waters in recent memory. The students have not been found and are presumed dead.

Donahue, 20, and Wilkes, 18, friends from Glocester who were both studying environmental science at URI, arrived at the small gray shingled house on Col. John Gardner Road after 10:30 Saturday night; Shloul, 21, of Pawtucket, arrived about an hour later. It was the first day of spring break.

The group of friends poured screwdrivers, watched TV and chatted. No one was drinking heavily, some who were there later told the police.

The mellow event was less a party, they said, than a gathering of good friends. All were expected to stay the night.

As the night turned into early morning, Donahue, an easygoing man known for his daring, got restless.

"Let's go on an adventure," declared Donahue, a friend told the police.

As the rest of the group headed to bed, Shloul, who was on leave from URI's nursing school, Donahue, Wilkes, and two others left the house for a walk along the rocky Narragansett coastline. Had it not been for the thick fog, a nearly full moon would have offered sweeping views of Dutch Island, Jamestown and, in the distance, the illuminated span of the Newport Bridge.

On the gravelly beach on the other side of the inlet, the group found an 11 1/2-foot rowboat resting on the sand. The boat was a familiar site on Little Beach and was used by a number of residents to get to boats that packed the mooring field in the summer, though the police have not determined the owner, according to Narragansett Police Chief J. David Smith.

Donahue, Wilkes and Shloul climbed in -- without life vests -- and began paddling around the inlet: Wilkes in the bow, Donahue in the stern, and Shloul in the middle. When the two friends on shore yelled to the boaters to say they were going back to the house, the three were laughing. Donahue and Wilkes each had one oar and were paddling the boat like a canoe.

Fifteen minutes after heading out, the group returned to shore. Donahue and Wilkes headed to the house to pick up a bottle of schnapps and raspberry vodka. Shloul waited by the boat.

At about 3 a.m., as a strong incoming tide pushed up the Bay, the group headed out again. Back at the house, the friends went to bed.

It wasn't until a Narragansett police officer knocked on the door at about 7 a.m. that the friends realized that their friends hadn't returned, according to Lt. Gerald Driscoll. The group quickly told the police about the previous night's activities. None of the friends who were interviewed by police officers the next morning appeared intoxicated or hungover, said Smith. "They were concerned and cooperative and quite lucid," he said.

The Coast Guard had already begun a massive search effort.

At about 4 a.m. a URI security officer , patroling the university's Narragansett Bay Campus, about a half mile from Little Beach, reported hearing loud voices coming from the water, but got no reply to his calls. The officer called URI and Narragansett police, which notified the Coast Guard.

When the Coast Guard arrived on the scene at 5:30, they soon discovered the partially submerged rowboat floating 1,200 yards off the coast of Bonnet Shores. The Coast Guard also found the two oars, a brown mesh hat belonging to Wilkes and a sandal, apparently belonging to Donahue, as well as two bottles of liquor. After two days of intensive searching from air, water and land, the effort was called off. Officials said there was little chance that anyone could survive long in the cold water. The cause of the accident has not been determined.

Smith, the Narragansett police chief, said he hoped people wouldn't jump to conclusions about the role alcohol may have played in what he called a tragic boating accident.

"We don't know, and may never know, to what extent the people on the boat had been drinking, if at all," said Smith.

asulzber@projo.com / (401) 277-7405