Search finds 'just four guys in a boat'

So, four men go out duck hunting in a rowboat Monday near Reynolds Channel off Atlantic Beach. They wave hello to a passerby driving across the Atlantic Beach Bridge.

Another passerby sees them wave, figures they're all in danger and calls 911. It triggers a search.

That's what police and the U.S. Coast Guard said happened Monday morning, when a 911 caller reported four boaters in trouble at 8:46 a.m.

Nassau County police said they scrambled a helicopter and a marine unit to the scene. The Coast Guard said they mobilized a rescue boat.

The bay constables, Atlantic Beach Rescue and the Long Beach Fire Department also were alerted, officials said.

Then, it turned out, when the boat and the hunters were found in nearby Bannister Creek it all proved to be a false alarm.

"A false alert," Coast Guard spokesman P.O. 1st Class David Schuhlein said. "Someone saw them and thought they were in trouble and called 911."

As a Nassau police spokesman said: "It was a bunch of duck hunters. Somebody must have seen them, thought they were in distress. It all turned out to be nothing . . . Just four guys in a boat, waving hands."