Crews work to keep the Blue Sea, aground and taking on water off Point Judith, from going farther ashore. Three people were rescued.

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The Providence Journal / Frieda Squires

NARRAGANSETT — Peter Maack, 54, invited friends Saturday night to a bonfire fueled by wood from his wrecked schooner, Truant.

The 1940s-era schooner broke up on rocks north of Hazard Avenue Friday night after he and salvage diver Bob Cherenzia, 51, removed its fuel tank and about 20 gallons of diesel fuel.

Fuel was also a concern yesterday after a 63-foot fishing boat from Montauk, N.Y., ran aground and began to flood about 30 feet from Coast Guard Station Point Judith. Three crew members were removed from the boat yesterday morning. Salvage workers tried to pump out the boat’s estimated 3,000 gallons of fuel, but rough seas forced them to abandon the effort and try again today.

Also yesterday, North Kingstown Harbormaster Mark Knapp answered rumors that the Truant had been deemed an eyesore and Maack had been forced to sail in bad weather because he’d been given a deadline to leave Wickford Harbor.

Harbormaster Knapp said the Truant was tied illegally to a mooring in Wickford Harbor, and the mooring’s owner had reported the violation to Knapp. Knapp said he and a police officer visited Maack to inform him the schooner was improperly moored. Knapp said he asked Maack about his plans and Maack said he planned to leave Wednesday.

When Knapp checked at 7:30 Wednesday morning, he said, the Truant was gone.

“He spent two days out in West Passage,” said Knapp, who has lived in Wickford 37 years and served for the last 8 as Wickford harbormaster. “He would not have been asked to leave the harbor in bad weather anyway.”

As to the allegation that Maack was given a deadline to remove an eyesore, Knapp said: “No harbormaster has the authority to ask someone to leave the harbor” for that.

Maack had sailed past Narragansett Pier Friday morning and reached Hazard Avenue when his rudder broke and he was pushed onto the rocks behind 290 Ocean Rd., a three-unit condo residence known as Ocean View and assessed at $3.44 million.

He got out of the Truant and into a sailing dory he’d been towing, said Anne O’Neil, who with her husband, former Attorney General Jim O’Neil, is helping Maack get relocated to Narragansett from California.

Maack was picked up from the dory by North Kingstown firefighters in a 14-foot inflatable boat. No one was injured. He and Cherenzia worked into the evening Friday removing gear and fuel.

The uninsured Truant was caught in a rising tide with a storm coming in. Bob McVey of Ocean Marine Insurance in Warwick, who watched from the rocks Friday evening as waves battered the sides and the sea crept up the deck, predicted that the Truant would be in pieces in a few hours. He was right. By 9 p.m. Friday it was gone.

He said the conditions were too hazardous to risk a tow.

Cherenzia’s assistant, Wendy Warner, 48, said Maack spent the weekend burning pieces of the wooden boat as they washed onto the rocks near his fire.

Off Point Judith, the Tug Otter and the Coast Guard were trying to save the Blue Sea, which McVey said was worth $450,000 and fully insured by his company.

It was too windy yesterday to position oil containment booms, McVey said, and a surfer was hired to paddle out with a rope. The plan was to haul in a hose to pump an estimated 3,000 gallons of fuel into a truck on shore.

Petty Officer 3rd Class Travis Gagnon said he was returning from a security check before dawn “when I just happened to see the Blue Sea really close to the station.

“I walked over to the waterline, and I could hear the boat hitting the rocks, so I went inside and hailed the vessel on the radio. They came back and said they were aground and taking on water.”

Michael Fallon, 47, Trevor Knight, 26, and a 17-year-old boy were instructed to get into their life raft. It was pulled to a 27-foot response boat and the three were taken to the Coast Guard station.

dnaylor@projo.com