This combination made from photos provided by the U.S. Coast Guard shows Perry Cohen, left, and Austin Stephanos, both 14 years old. Cohen and Stephanos were last seen Friday afternoon, July 24, 2015, in the Jupiter, Fla. area buying fuel for their 19-foot boat before embarking on a fishing trip. (U.S. Coast Guard via AP) ORG XMIT: NY111(Photo: Uncredited, AP)
The U.S. Coast Guard said it was broadening its search for a pair of Florida 14-year-olds missing since Friday after their capsized boat was found on Sunday,<span style="color: Red;">*</span>67 miles off Daytona Beach.
Police in Tequesta, Fla., 175 miles south, where the boys live, tweeted that the 19-foot boat had "no souls on board."
Authorities said Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen were last seen about 1:30 p.m. <span style="color: Red;">*</span>ET Friday in the Jupiter, Fla., area, near Tequesta, buying $110 worth of fuel. They were reported missing about three and a half hours later.
By midday Sunday, the Coast Guard had searched more than 25,000 square nautical miles for the boys, Petty Officer Mark Barney told CNN.
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Coast Guard Petty Officer Stephen Lehmann said the location of the boat prompted searchers to recalculate their plans, the Palm Beach
Sun Sentinel reported.
Although the two boys fish together often in the Jupiter Inlet area, they were not prepared for an extended outing, Barney said. "Initial reports were that they went to the Bahamas, but the family says they did not have supplies for that," Barney told the
Sun Sentinel. "They did not pack water or food for two days."
He said the single-engine boat provided only a small area of cover over the center console.
Cohen's stepfather, Nick Korniloff, told reporters on Sunday that the boys were experienced on the water but were not allowed to take the boat out into the ocean. He said the teens would have never been allowed to boat to the Bahamas alone, but a social media post from one of the boys indicated they might have been headed to the Bahamas, according to the Coast Guard. Authorities initially believed they may have been headed there, but learned from the boys' parents that the pair typically do not go farther than an offshore ledge that drops 200 to 300 feet.
"After speaking to the parents, they're pretty certain these boys wouldn't have ventured that far off," Barney said.
The search, using<span style="color: Red;">*</span>a Coast Guard C-130 airplane, a helicopter crew, an HR 144 plane, two U.S. Customs and Border Protection planes and two Coast Guard cutters, was "one of the longest and most intense searches I've seen in my three years here," Barney said.
Carly Black, Stephanos' mother, said on Sunday, "We are going to find them today. We are going to bring them home."
The effort has even prompted NFL Hall of Famer Joe Namath, a neighbor of one of the boys, to offer a $100,000 reward. Namath said he hoped the appeal for information could help the search. He told reporters on Sunday that the boys are both skilled boaters. "We've got to believe in their wherewithal.
"We'll keep on looking until we find them. We're all praying. ... The good Lord's gotta help us out."
Barney said many pilots and boaters had volunteered to help with the search, but that the offers were not necessarily welcome.
"Volunteers searching is one of the things we're trying to discourage," he said. "Although we appreciate people pitching in, we don't want to create a dangerous situation and have people injured."
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