Riverboat, once a staple in Newport Harbor, sinks off the coast of Long Beach – Orange County Register

On better days, the Newport Princess passengers enjoyed fine dining and champagne as the 62-foot Mississippi-style pedal boat cruised through Newport Harbor.

The ship could carry up to 150 people on board its three decks, which were lined with ornate white guardrails and sat over a black wooden hull.

The 77-year-old boat’s service as a quirky venue for weddings and corporate events ended amid the rise of COVID-19 and related mandates, said Jack Wall of Al Larson Boat Shop, a shipyard that owns the ships. served Electra cruises.

The boat, which appears to have a new owner, now appears doomed as it sank off the coast of Long Beach in the Pacific Ocean on Tuesday, December 14, during this week’s storm.

• Life jackets and chairs floated on the beaches in Long Beach after the Newport Princess sank on Tuesday, December 14th. The 62 foot long merchant ship served as a host to luxury events, and its upper decks were still visible over the water on Wednesday. The Newport Princess is a 62 foot long boat that sank near the coast of Long Beach on Tuesday, December 14th. Luxury events once took place on its upper decks and were still visible over the water on Wednesday. (By Jesse Lopez, Grunion / SCNG.)

• The Newport Princess was a 62-foot boat that sank near the coast of Long Beach on Tuesday, December 14th. Luxury events were once held on its upper decks and were still visible over the water on Wednesday. (By Jesse Lopez, Grunion / SCNG.)

• The Newport Princess was a 62-foot boat that sank near the coast of Long Beach on Tuesday, December 14th. Luxury events were once held on its upper decks and were still visible over the water on Wednesday. (By Jesse Lopez, Grunion / SCNG.)

On Wednesday, the upper deck was still visible from the bank, the boat was in the somewhat shallow water.

No one was on board the boat when it began to take water, officials from the Long Beach Fire Department’s Marine Safety Division and the U.S. Coast Guard said.

To prevent other ships from bumping into the ship, the Coast Guard has demarcated the area with buoys, said Petty Officer Aidan Cooney. Officials have been in contact with his owner, who is responsible for getting him out of the water.

“Although the ship has a capacity of 750 gallons of fuel, reports say there were less than 100 gallons on board,” Cooney said. “So the environmental impacts are not too serious.”

Stacks of life jackets marked “Newport Princess”, chairs and other debris from aboard the ship littered the shoreline after the boat sank, Long Beach Marine Safety Chief Gonzalo Medina said. The owner sent a team to pick up the items.

The Newport Princess owner, trapped by COVID-19 restrictions, was sold to someone who kept him moored at Island White, an oil rig about a mile off the coast of Long Beach, for most of 2021, said Wall.

Agreements have been made with a salvage company to salvage and demolish the Newport Princess, Cooney and Medina said. Officials expect the process to begin later this week and could cost the boat owner $ 30,000 to $ 50,000, Medina said.

The boat was powered by a 400-horsepower diesel engine, according to public records, and its hull was waterproof when it was last serviced by Al Larson Boat Shop in late 2020 or early 2021, Wall said.

He wasn’t entirely surprised to learn that it had sunk.

“It was probably on the oil rig because, like most of the other boats out there, the owner had nowhere else to go,” Wall said. “And a lot of them are not serviced, so we hear of a doom out there every now and then.”

The Long Beach Coast Guard and Marine Security Division worked to find out what had caused the Newport Princess to sink. It’s unclear how the boat picked up water to push it into the Pacific and whether it had anything to do with the storm that hit southern California on Tuesday.

“It would be unlikely that a seaworthy ship would sink in a storm of this magnitude,” said Medina.