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Training ship for teenage girls runs aground in Woods Hole

E-mail|Link|Comments () August 5, 2009 05:19 PM

By Michaela Stanelun, Globe Correspondent

A tall ship ran aground this morning on rocks in Great Harbor off of Woods Hole and is being towed to Martha's Vineyard this afternoon to be checked for damage, Coast Guard officials said.

The 118-foot Unicorn, a training ship devoted to teaching girls to sail, became stuck on rocks about 400 yards off Nonamesset Island. The ship's crew radioed the Coast Guard at 10:30 a.m. asking for assistance, the Coast Guard said in a statement.

A 41-foot Coast Guard boat raced to the scene and began removing people from the ship. No injuries or pollution were reported and the cause of the incident hasn't been determined.

There were 16 female passengers on the ship. Nine teenagers and an adult chaperone were taken to Woods Hole and interviewed by an investigator; six crew members stayed on board to assist the Coast Guard.

“Another investigator was sent to the Unicorn, to see if there was any damage and if it is still seaworthy,” said Petty Officer Connie Terrell, a Coast Guard spokeswoman.

Shortly after 1:30 p.m. the boat was pulled by tugboats off the rocks, and the passengers reboarded, Terrell said.

The Unicorn, built in 1947, is the only tall ship in the world with an all-woman crew.

Dawn Santamaria, the owner of Tallship Unicorn and the founder of the program Sisters Under Sail, said she was aboard the ship as it cut between Woods Hole and Nonamesset Island.

"We were just on the edge of the channel and we hit some rocks," Santamaria said. The ship was en route to Newport, R.I.

The ship was towed by a commercial tugboat to Vineyard Haven this afternoon, where a commercial dive team will go underneath the boat to see if there was any damage, Terrell said.