A short boat trip in southeastern Alaska ended with two men unaccounted for. On February 12, 2017, 45-year-old Troy Steven Smart of Metlakatla and 38-year-old Timothy Staples left the Mountain Point boat launch near Ketchikan in a 16-foot skiff bound for Cowboys Camp on Annette Island. When they did not arrive, a concerned fiancée alerted the Coast Guard and a multi-agency search was launched.

Search teams from Coast Guard Air Station Sitka and Station Ketchikan, the Coast Guard Cutter Maple, and the Ketchikan Volunteer Rescue Squad covered roughly 200 miles, including Nichols Passage and Tongass Narrows. The men’s skiff was eventually found capsized and empty in Blank Inlet, about 100 yards north of Blank Island near the southern end of Gravina Island. Debris including a life jacket and an oar were scattered nearby.

Despite the recovered vessel and an extensive search, neither Troy Smart nor Timothy Staples were found, and the Alaska State Troopers opened missing persons cases. The cause of the capsize is unknown. Did anyone in the Metlakatla or Ketchikan area see the skiff that day or notice activity around Blank Inlet?