For those of you who don't already know, it's been a tough couple of days.

Late Sunday morning, I received a call from my sister's cell phone. She began to ask for something but was unable to finish. She put my mother on the phone to explain what was going on. She told me that my sister's husband was up in Port Charlotte with some friends and there was some sort of boating accident. My sister's husband was unaccounted for. I left for her home, immediately. When I had arrived, my sister and her parents-in-law had already left for the Port Charlotte area. My sister returned home late last night, and unfortunately there is no good news to report.

As I understand it, here is basically what happened.

Late Saturday night, the boat began to quickly sink. A small portion of the front of the boat remained above water. The life jackets that were on the boat were trapped at the back of the boat and could not be recovered for use. The decision was made for one of the 4 men to stay behind and use the small, remaining portion of the boat to attempt to stay afloat. The remaining three (my sister's husband included) used the three available seat cushions as floatation devices and made an attempt for land.

One of the three made it to land early the next morning. It took approximately 10 hours for him to reach the shore where he was found. A search was immediately launched and the one person who stayed at the boat was also recovered. Both were treated for hypothermia.

My sister's husband and the other man were never recovered. After a search by eight different agencies, covering 500 square miles, the determination was made that it was highly unlikely they would have survived the hypothermia. The search was officially ended Monday evening. As I understand it, a smaller recovery team is still working in the area to confirm the outcome.