On Saturday July 3rd I was on boat patrol on Yuba Reservoir just south of the Painted Rocks boat ramp at approximately 1430 when a boat sped up to my location and informed me that there was a sailboat sinking just north of the island at Painted Rocks.  I immediately headed north towards the sinking vessel.

When I arrived at the scene I found that another boater had hooked on to the bow of the sinking sailboat and was pulling it northwest towards the Narrows at approximately 10 MPH.  There were three people hanging on to the stern of the sailboat while it was being pulled.  They asked me to get the tow boat stopped which I did.  I positioned my vessel to the side of the disabled sailboat and asked the people if they wanted to jump off the sailboat and climb on to my patrol boat.  subject let go and I pulled her into my boat along with another individual who was hanging onto the sailboat who was just trying to help out from another nearby boat.

operator then climbed into my boat and we hooked one of my lines onto the bow of the sailboat and I pulled along side of it.  operator got back into the sailboat and started bailing water and I got our submersible pump started and got water pumping out if it.  After about 10 minutes of doing this we could see that we were not making any progress and that the water level in the sailboat was actually increasing.  operator got back into my boat and we tried to pull the sailboat back towards the Painted Rocks boat ramp.  As soon as I started pulling the sailboat it took on more water and sunk further down.  We slowed down and the sailboat spun over and was upside down.  At this time we could see that the keel had slipped out of the hull of the boat and that there would be no way to keep water from pouring into the sailboat.  We also noticed that the mast had broken off and that the keel was bent.  I stopped again and operator tied a line on to the side of the sailboat and we tried to flip it back over.  We were able to flip it over but as soon as we did and started towing it again it flipped back upside down.  I asked operator what he wanted me to do and he told me to pull it into the dock upside down and that he would just hang on to the back of it while it towed.  

I got the sailboat back to the shoreline near the boat ramp and operator was able to flip it back right side up.  Ranger tied the line to his truck and we pulled the sailboat out of the water and up on shore.  operator and subject then rode back to the Oasis boat ramp with Quagga Officer and brought their tow vehicle back to retrieve the sailboat.  

No was hurt during this incident but damage to the sailboat is estimated at approximately $2,000.
Scipio                        