Zuckerberg’s superyacht ignored emergency channel, failed to aid stranded boat - Ars Technica

Overview

Zuckerberg’s superyacht ignored emergency channel, failed to aid stranded boat

Zuckerberg’s superyacht and support ship were slow to heed Coast Guard call.

Details

Social media scuttlebutt about Mark Zuckerberg’s $300 million superyacht failing to assist stranded boaters off the coast of Alaska was partly corroborated by ship-tracking data—and eventually prompted responses from both the US Coast Guard and a spokesperson for Zuckerberg.

The incident was made public when Michael Love, a passenger aboard the replica steamship Wilderness Legacy during an Alaska cruise, posted about it on the social media platform Bluesky. The ship detoured to rescue a stranded 21-foot skiff with two women, a child and a dog, after the US Coast Guard had supposedly first radioed Zuckerberg’s superyacht, Launchpad, for help without success.

“There was near unanimous booing when the captain announced this,” Love wrote in describing the Alaska cruise passengers’ response to the lack of help from Zuckerberg’s ship.

The US Coast Guard described being hailed for assistance by the stranded boat located near Point Highland, Alaska, at 9:32 pm on August 3, in a statement shared by Halifax Shipping News. After the Coast Guard determined the vessel was not in distress, it issued a marine assistance request broadcast asking for voluntary help from nearby mariners.

This is an important distinction because it means nearby vessels were not legally obligated to respond. If the Coast Guard had determined the stranded boat was in distress, then both international maritime law and US law would have legally required ship captains to render assistance.

Although Launchpad and its $30 million support ship, Wingman, were not legally obligated to assist in this case, it may have represented a missed opportunity to do a little bit of good, according to Love, the passenger aboard the Wilderness Legacy.

“Frankly, if I was Mark Zuckerberg I would be absolutely ecstatic at a chance to do something helpful for someone in need and maybe get some good PR out of it,” Love told the Alaska Beacon in a Bluesky message.

Zuckerberg and his family were not aboard the superyacht at the time of the incident, according to a spokesperson for the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative in a statement shared with Halifax Shipping News and the Alaska Beacon.

Ship-tracking data using AIS transponder data actively broadcast by each vessel shows that Zuckerberg’s 387-foot superyacht was initially moving ahead of the 192-foot Wilderness Legacy at a slightly faster speed. But then Launchpad slowed to a stop and allowed Wilderness Legacy to pass it.

Wilderness Legacy appears to proceed with assisting the stranded boat, as described by the You Tube channel The Yacht Report in a video showing the AIS tracking paths. The Coast Guard confirmed that the ship towed the boat to Farragut Bay so that it could find safe anchorage, and the Alaska Beacon reported that Wilderness Legacy was able to refuel the skiff for the rest of its journey.

However, the Coast Guard statement made no mention of Zuckerberg’s superyacht, Launchpad.

Launchpad’s support ship, Wingman, is described by the publication Yacht World as being equipped with deck space for carrying a helicopter, a Triton submarine that acts as a personal submersible for superyachts, water scooters, and multiple smaller boats.

Ship-tracking data shows that Wingman moved past both Launchpad and the Wilderness Legacy without stopping. It also shows that Launchpad finally resumed moving again after the Wilderness Legacy appeared to return from having assisted the small skiff.

The Zuckerberg spokesperson offered an explanation for why Launchpad did not initially respond to the Coast Guard’s request for assistance.

“As the Coast Guard noted, the boat was not in distress, and by the time the crew reviewed the Coast Guard contact on a different radio channel from the one they were operating on, the assist was already underway,” the spokesperson said in the statement shared with news outlets. “We’re grateful all parties are safe.”

But Democrat Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, himself a member of an elite sailing club, in a Facebook post criticized the lack of response from Zuckerberg’s superyacht. “Vessels are supposed to monitor channel 16 at all times, for this exact purpose,” Whitehouse wrote. “Billionaires don’t follow that rule either?”

The US government’s radio watchkeeping regulations require any vessel equipped with a VHF marine radiotelephone to maintain watch on channel 16—reserved for emergency messages—whenever the radiotelephone is not being used for communication. Marine radiotelephones typically have dual-watch or even tri-watch features that specifically enable monitoring of multiple channels, with the transmissions on the emergency channel automatically taking priority.

That means any nearby ship monitoring the channel should have heard the stranded boaters asking the Coast Guard for help, along with hearing the Coast Guard’s follow-on request for assistance. It is also unclear why the crew of the support ship Wingman did not initially hear or heed the Coast Guard broadcast.

Zuckerberg’s superyacht has previously courted controversy for turning off its AIS transponder and “going dark” to avoid public ship-tracking services, according to Yacht World. That is a tactic only used by “shadow fleet” vessels carrying sanctioned oil or gas, illegal fishing boats, and the high-profile owners of luxury yachts, such as Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos.

But for safety-of-navigation reasons, the Coast Guard typically requires vessels to keep AIS activated in US waters. Such AIS tracking data helped shed a little more light on this latest controversy surrounding Launchpad.

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Key Takeaways

Zuckerberg’s superyacht ignored emergency channel, failed to aid stranded boat
Zuckerberg’s superyacht and support ship were slow to heed Coast Guard call
Social media scuttlebutt about Mark Zuckerberg’s $300 million superyacht failing to assist stranded boaters off the coast of Alaska was partly corroborated by ship-tracking data—and eventually prompted responses from both the US Coast Guard and a spokesperson for Zuckerberg
The incident was made public when Michael Love, a passenger aboard the replica steamship Wilderness Legacy during an Alaska cruise, posted about it on the social media platform Bluesky
“There was near unanimous booing when the captain announced this,” Love wrote in describing the Alaska cruise passengers’ response to the lack of help from Zuckerberg’s ship