Massachusetts governor asks Navy to help recover video recorder from sunken fishing boat

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey has asked the U.S. Navy to help retrieve a video recorder and hard drive from the wreck of the fishing vessel Lily Jean, which sank in January and left seven crew members dead.

Healey and State Sen. Bruce Tarr sent a letter this week to the Secretary of the Navy requesting assistance with the recovery. The wreck lies more than 300 feet down in the Atlantic about 25 miles off the Massachusetts coast. The equipment could help determine the cause of the sinking.

A spokesperson for the Office of the Secretary of the Navy confirmed receipt of the letter and said a response is being prepared for the governor's office.

Healey also wants to recover the remaining six bodies from the 72-foot boat. Only the body of Captain Accursio "Gus" Sanfilippo has been recovered so far.

The other victims were crew members Paul Beal Jr., John Rousanidis, Freeman Short and Sean Therrien, along with NOAA fisheries observer Jada Samitt.

Donna Short, the mother of Freeman Short, said recovering the bodies matters more than determining the cause. She spoke to her son a few days before the trip and told him she loved him. She wants him buried next to his grandfathers, both veterans.

The National Transportation Safety Board and the U.S. Coast Guard are investigating the sinking. The Coast Guard suspended its search for the missing crew on Jan. 31, the day after the boat went down. The NTSB does not conduct body recoveries.

Coast Guard watchstanders received an EPIRB alert from the vessel at about 6:50 a.m. on Jan. 30. Crews searched 1,047 square miles over 24 hours and found debris, the captain's body and an unoccupied life raft. Officials determined that all reasonable search efforts had been exhausted.