[September 23, 2011] Surviving overnight in lake has two counting blessings Tweet Sep 23, 2011 (The Buffalo News - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- When Joe Adornetto realized his tackle box was floating, he knew something was wrong. Six miles from land in Lake Ontario, the Buffalo fisherman quickly realized his 17-foot boat was filling with 68-degree water. It was moments from sinking. Reacting quickly, Adornetto told his friend, Corey Willis of Tonawanda, to grab a life jacket, knowing that Willis couldn't swim. His golden retriever, Apollo, began to panic. Without a radio, Adornetto made two calls to 911 on his iPhone. Both calls were dropped, and soon after so was his phone -- into a lake with 5-foot waves. Now neck deep and treading water, Adornetto saw the boat's cooler seat pop up about 50 yards away. He and Apollo swam toward it. Willis and Apollo climbed onto the cooler. Adornetto hung off the side of it, praying that a freighter would come by before sundown. It was shortly after 7 p.m. Saturday. "We were near the shipping channel, so three freighters went by within 300 yards of us," Adornetto said, sitting in front of his North Buffalo home on the seat that saved his life. An avid fisherman, he had been in some sticky situations before, but never anything as bad as this. "We screamed, we yelled. They just went by. To see those ships, so big and so close, and for them not to be able to see or hear us, was just devastating." Night fell. Adornetto knew his family would soon realize his absence from a 9 p.m. party and call for help, and he was right. A Coast Guard team left from the Niagara River in search of the wayward vessel, and a helicopter from Detroit attempted to find the men and their dog from up above. "But it was very dark that night. Unless you ran right on top of them, it would have been pretty hard to see anyone," said Eric Mazurek of the U. S. Coast Guard, who was in charge of the unit doing search and rescue that evening. "Jeez, I kept thinking to myself, 'It's such a beautiful night,'" Adornetto said, morbidly chuckling. "And I just wanted to finish that sentence and say, 'It's such a beautiful night to die.'" Adornetto knew their chances of being found before daybreak were slim. But determined to have some hope and calm his friend, they began paddling toward shore. "I just knew I needed to stay alert, awake," said Adornetto, 26. "Every time I closed my eyes to rest for 30 seconds I opened them up and had to say to myself, '[Darn], I'm pointing toward Toronto, I gotta turn around again.' " But the current was strong, and the cooler-turned-flotation device had been pulled northwest, farther into Canadian waters and farther from land. The Coast Guard determined their search radius after contacting Adornetto's cellphone provider, who gave a rough estimate on where to search. But the estimate was off. "Cellphones are unreliable, especially [on Lake Ontario]," said Mazurek. "You definitely need to have a marine radio as a first means of communication if you're out there." As Saturday turned into Sunday, both men got colder and colder. Adornetto joked to Willis that when they reached the shore, there would be beautiful women there waiting for them, and they would still have a great evening. But after 3 a.m., Willis began shivering uncontrollably, and as light came, it became clear just how far from the shore they were. "Right around daybreak, I knew I was a couple of hours away from being too cold to do anything," said Adornetto. "And Corey was an hour from losing consciousness." At first light, Adornetto saw a helicopter approaching from the Toronto skyline. Canadian Coast Guard had taken over the search. Both men were found within 15 minutes and brought ashore for treatment in St. Catharines General Hospital. Willis' body temperature had fallen into the low 80s. Apollo was perky as ever Wednesday, with only a minor leg injury. Adornetto's body temperature had, amazingly, stayed around 95 degrees, and he started to feel normal after a long nap. Wednesday, he had one plan. "I'm going fishing today," he said, having already bought a new pole. "But I promised my family it wouldn't be on a boat." [email protected] ___ (c)2011 The Buffalo News (Buffalo, N.Y.) Visit The Buffalo News (Buffalo, N.Y.) at www.buffalonews.com Distributed by MCT Information Services [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]