The U.S. Coast Guard searched by boat, helicopter and plane Thursday night and Friday morning after receiving a report of orange flares seen near the mouth of the Sheepscot River.
At about 6 p.m. Thursday, the Coast Guard issued an urgent marine information broadcast over the radio and immediately launched a 47-foot motorized lifeboat from a Coast Guard station in Boothbay Harbor to search the area, spokesman Lt. Scott McCann said Friday.
A MH-60 helicopter was diverted from the Coast Guard’s Cape Cod station in Massachusetts to assist in the search Thursday night, and Georgetown firefighters searched the area off Reid State Park but found nothing.
Early Friday morning, the lifeboat began the search anew with the assistance of a Coast Guard airplane from Cape Cod.
According to McCann, a homeowner on Southport Island reported seeing the flares from his house.
McCann said no people or boats were reported missing in the area, and the search was suspended just before noon Friday.
“The toughest thing about these cases is not knowing what the reporting party saw,” he said. “From the details he gave us, we thought it probably was a flare.”
