Diver hurt searching O.C. jetty for boater

A sheriff’s rescue diver was rushed to a hospital with leg injuries Friday after becoming entangled in a sunken sailboat while searching the wreckage for its missing owner.

Deputy Ken Kropidlowski, an 18-year veteran of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department and a member of its dive team, was 30-feet deep off a jetty in Newport Beach when he got tangled in debris about 11 a.m. and made an emergency ascent, Jim Amormino, a sheriff’s spokesman, said.

“He was in extreme pain and had to be assisted onto the boat,” Amormino said.

“He was rushed to harbor headquarters where an ambulance was waiting to take him to Hoag Hospital.”

Kropidlowski was treated for a torn ligament, his leg placed in a splint and released from the hospital on crutches, Amormino said.

He is expected to fully recover.

The 10-member dive team failed to find any trace of missing Phoenix boater William Eugene Ott during a two-hour search of the 30-foot sailboat.

Ott’s wife said he had been sailing to the Channel Islands on Tuesday.

The next day the boat struck a rock jetty near the Wedge in high winds and quickly sank in surging seas.

Ott’s identity was traced from a bottle of prescription medication found floating near the spot the boat went down, but the 61-year-old veteran sailor has not been heard from.

Amormino said divers finished searching the remaining 10% of the wreckage.

“We still haven’t found anything,” Amormino said, adding that a few deep rock crevices remained to be searched.

“It’s somewhat of a mystery.”

He said the search team planned to reassemble today to “re-evaluate conditions and see where we’re at.”

[email protected]