Posted on 09/13/2005 1:59:25 PM PDT by WestTexasWend
ALASKA - Larry Csonka, a bruising fullback for the Dolphins' Super Bowl-winning teams, was rescued by the Coast Guard in the sea off Alaska.
As a fullback for the undefeated 1972 Miami Dolphins, Larry Csonka was known for his toughness. He needed all that toughness when he was lifted in a basket into a rescue helicopter during a storm that threatened to capsize his boat in the Bering Sea off Alaska.
Csonka, 58, and five others, including a film crew from his television show on the Outdoor Life Network, were not hurt, but the boat was abandoned.
''We might very well have died if we stayed out there. It was tense,'' Csonka told The Anchorage Daily News in a phone interview from a hotel in Unalaska, a city of 4,000 located 800 miles southwest of Anchorage. ``It was 10 or 12 hours of moment-to-moment with sea sickness and not being able to drink water because it was so rough, and hanging onto each other.''
Csonka told the newspaper that the passengers feared the boat would sink or hit rock.
Csonka, a Hall of Famer, had been hunting for reindeer on Alaska's remote Umnak Island off the Aleutian Islands on Wednesday while filming an episode of his TV show.
Their 28-foot boat ran into a squall with gale-force winds, massive swells and driving rain, the newspaper reported. The nearest Coast Guard helicopter was 600 miles away in Kodiak, meaning a 10-hour trip.
LIFTED IN BASKET
The helicopter arrived Thursday and managed to get each of them off the boat, hoisting them individually in a basket. Csonka, Audrey Bradshaw, film-crew members John Dietrich and Rich Larson, and Thomas McCay, the guide for the hunt, were taping the event for the show North to Alaska when the weather worsened. Also on board the boat was captain Dwight Johnson.
''I have never experienced any weather that rough in the size of the boat that I was in,'' Johnson said. ``I could not control the boat. I did the best I could for about 10 to 11 hours to keep it afloat until we were evacuated. Everyone was seasick. Everyone had a loss of energy. It took a lot of persuasion on my part to get people into their survival suits, but the bottom line is we survived.''
Coast Guard Petty Officer Paul Roszkowski said the waters were so cold that a person would live for only about 15 minutes without survival gear.
A subsequent Coast Guard search for the boat failed, and the Coast Guard speculated it drifted away or sank.
A video of the rescue can be seen on the Coast Guard's website (uscgalaska.com). It shows the boat swaying in the rough seas as the passengers in orange survival suits are raised toward the helicopter.
Csonka was a bruising, battering runner, considered the best fullback in Dolphins history and one of nine Dolphins in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He is the team's all-time rushing leader with 6,737 yards and 53 touchdowns, and helped the Dolphins reach three consecutive Super Bowls (1971-73). The 1972 Dolphins, with Csonka a key leader, were the only undefeated team in NFL history.
Drafted out of Syracuse University in 1968, Csonka played seven years with Miami, then shocked Dolphins fans when he and teammates Paul Warfield and Jim Kiick signed with Memphis of the World Football League in 1975. He returned to the NFL a year later with the New York Giants, spending three seasons there before finishing his career with the Dolphins in 1979. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1987.
Since his career ended, Csonka has been an outdoorsman, a pitchman for Miller Beer and a successful public speaker. A resident of Lisbon, Ohio, Csonka travels frequently to Alaska to tape fishing and hunting shows.
NUMBER RETIRED
Csonka has distanced himself from football and South Florida in recent years. He returned to Miami in 2002 for the retirement of his number (39) and for a 30-year anniversary celebration of the Dolphins' undefeated season.
He also was the main speaker at a party that owner Wayne Huizenga threw for Don Shula after the coach retired after the 1995 season.
Kiick, a running back who was Csonka's roommate with the Dolphins and co-authored a book with him in 1972, said Monday he hasn't spoken to him in seven or eight months.
''I wish I could speak to him more often,'' said Kiick, an investigator with the Broward County public defender's office. ``He more or less has gone in his own direction. He has gotten away from football. He enjoys hunting and fishing. He has a new life, and that's what he enjoys.''
Csonka has a son who is a chief warrant officer serving in the Coast Guard. Csonka runs Zonk! Productions, which films episodes for his outdoor sports TV show.
Csonka Sinka?
I can't wait to see THAT show on OLN
I can't wait to see THAT show on OLN
oh - I thought it was a rescue of a dolphin from the New Orleans Sea World.
You wouldn't want to be caught calling him Flipper.
Come on how much of a rescue could it have been.... after all he was a dolphin! :)
Larry Czonka, if you read this, thanks. Plantation H.S. 1971-72.
Yes, I post using my real name.
5.56mm
Did I read that right.?
Six grown men, in a 28 Foot boat, in the Bering Sea,off the coast of Alaska. With camera and sound equipment on board.??
Two words: HO-LEE-CRAP. !!
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