Coast Guard rescues man from rocks on Fishers Island

A U.S. Coast Guard helicopter was used to rescue a Connecticut man whose boat hit rocks at high tide off Fishers Island on Saturday morning.

A 50-foot tug called Semper Fi hit the rocks off Race Point.

Boat owner Douglas Walker, 67, of East Lyme, Conn., made a Mayday radio call about 7:30 a.m. A Coast Guard rescue boat from New London, Conn., and a commercial boat from Mystic responded to Walker's distress call but they weren't able to help because of rocks, said Peter Winters, a Coast Guard spokesman.

A helicopter was called in from Cape Cod, and the crew used a hoist to free Walker from his stranded boat. The rocks had ripped a hole in the boat's hull and the boat took on 1,000 gallons of water, Winters said.

Walker, who was wearing a life jacket, wasn't injured. He was transporting the tug, which he planned to use as a recreational craft, from Baltimore to Connecticut.

The rescue took about two hours, and the Coast Guard was working on removing the boat from the rocks Saturday afternoon.