Donald Bright, 31, was aboard the 98-foot crab boat Barbarossa when the vessel vanished in the Bering Sea. On February 10, 1991, while operating roughly 30 to 40 miles west of St. George Island near the Pribilof Islands, the Barbarossa’s crew sent a brief mayday around 1:00 a.m.: May-Day, we’re going over, we’re about 40 miles west of St. George Island, please hurry. The transmission did not identify the ship by name.

The six-man crew — skipper George Brandenburg, Donald Bright, Dennis Olberding, Timothy Schmitt, Darrell Gross, and Brian McPherson — were never found. The Coast Guard conducted an air-and-sea search in 30-knot winds and 14-foot seas but recovered no wreckage, life raft, survival suits, or EPIRBs. The prevailing theory is a rapid capsizing, possibly due to being weighted down by crab pots, but the circumstances remain unresolved.

Did anyone with knowledge of the Barbarossa’s last trip or the crew’s preparations come forward with details that might explain how the vessel disappeared so completely?