Former US deputy sheriff dies, three others missing after boat capsizes near Alcatraz

Thursday, 16 July 2026

A family gathering to scatter a loved one's ashes in San Francisco Bay ended in disaster when their 15-metre cruiser capsized and sank near Alcatraz Island.

Clifford Joseph Boisa, 79, a former reserve deputy sheriff and retired Department of Fish and Wildlife budget analyst, died in the sinking, while three other passengers remain missing.

Commercial fishermen and emergency crews managed to rescue 16 of the 20 people on board from the frigid waters as the three-level vessel went down.

While weather conditions on the bay were described as not unusual and no small watercraft advisory was active, the official cause of the sinking remains unclear.

A former reserve deputy sheriff has been identified as the person who died when a boat carrying 20 people sank in the frigid waters near Alcatraz Island in San Francisco.

Local media reported Clifford Joseph Boisa, 79, of Sutter County, died after the boat capsized in San Francisco Bay on Tuesday (local time).

Boisa reportedly served as a reserve deputy sheriff from 1987 until 2011. He had also worked as a budget analyst for the Department of Fish and Wildlife before retiring in 2001.

Those aboard were members of an extended family who had gathered for a memorial service that involved spreading a loved one’s ashes in the bay, local media reported.

Three people remained missing, while the other passengers were rescued.

Some of the swells on the bay were up to 1.5, said Lt Joseph England of the Richmond Police Department, who responded to the scene.

“The wind was coming underneath the Golden Gate and blowing toward Alcatraz,” England said on Wednesday. “If you have a smaller vessel and you don’t know what you’re doing and you’re hitting those swells sideways, it can lead to disaster.”

The vessel was a 15m pleasure craft with a cabin and upper deck named Volare, registered out of Stockton, California, said Lt Mariano Elias, a San Francisco Fire Department spokesperson.

There was no small watercraft advisory at the time, which would warn boaters about weather hazards. Conditions on the bay weren’t unusual, with winds around 27kph, said Roger Gass, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service.

Cause of sinking not clear

The vessel was about 550m off Alcatraz, between the island and the Golden Gate Bridge, when it began sinking on Tuesday afternoon.

The cause of the sinking was not immediately clear.

The US Coast Guard initially classified the emergency as a “vessel fire” and said 19 people were aboard. However, the San Francisco Fire Department later said rescuers found no evidence of a fire.

Fire officials described the vessel as a three-level cruiser that was mostly underwater by the time rescuers arrived, with only its top deck remaining above the surface.

Some passengers were already in the water while others remained aboard.

Commercial fishermen Mike Montoya and Justin Marceline reportedly helped pull people from the water as the vessel went down.

“There was even people banging at the windows as they were like filing out, and as soon as people were hitting the water, we were just trying to pick them up as fast as we can,” the pair said, according to the New York Post.

“Some people didn’t even have life vests on and they were drowning.”

The Coast Guard and San Francisco Fire Department were continuing to search for the three missing people, using thermal imaging, tide predictions and modelling to guide search efforts.

– with AP