Was Coast Guard Hoaxed by Distress Call?
BOLDUAN: The Coast Guard says it's called officers for missing boaters off the coast of California amid questions about whether the distress call was even real. CNN's Dan Simon reports.</s>DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They sent out numerous boats and aircraft to rescue four people, including two children, allegedly on a sinking boat. This was the last radio transmission from the vessel operator.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Coast Guard, Coast Guard, we are abandoning ship. This is the Charm Blow. We are abandoning ship.</s>SIMON: Is that the voice of a hoaxster? Was this whole thing -- a search that spanned the area the size of West Virginia and cost taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars -- just a prank? The Coast Guard says it's a possibility. First, the name of the boat, Charm Blow. Don Montoro is the Coast Guard sector commander responsible for the search.</s>DON MONTORO, U.S. COAST GUARD: We go through our databases, we went through customs databases. We also went through databases of local law-enforcement agencies to search for the vessel, and tried to identify it.</s>SIMON (on camera): And what did you find?</s>MONTORO: We -- unfortunately, we haven't found anything at this point.</s>SIMON (voice-over): And what about a missing persons report?</s>MONTORO: We haven't received any notifications of any missing persons.</s>SIMON (on camera): Is that unusual?</s>MONTORO: I haven't experienced that before, so...</s>SIMON (voice-over): This isn't the first time the Coast Guard has turned up empty on a high-profile search for missing boaters. Last May, it searched for six people in the waters off Galveston, Texas, after a mayday call from a sinking boat. Then a few weeks later, a caller claimed there were three people dead and 20 people in the water off Sandy Hook, New Jersey.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have 21 souls on board, 20 in the water right now. I have three deceased on board, nine injured because of the explosion we've had.</s>SIMON: Authorities later determined the call came from the land and was a hoax. As for the radio transmission in California...</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Coast Guard, Coast Guard, we are abandoning ship. This is the "Charm Blow." We are abandoning ship.</s>SIMON (on camera): Based upon what he's saying over the radio, you thought that was real?</s>MONTORO: Absolutely. And we treated it as such. We treat every call as it was our own child out there and we're searching for them.</s>SIMON: Now, making a false distress call is a felony punishable by up to ten years in prison and a $250,000 fine, plus the cost of the wasted search effort. In this case, it would be hundreds of thousands of dollars -- Wolf and Kate.</s>BOLDUAN: As well they should get in trouble if they're wasting that time, if that turns out to be true. Dan Simon, great report. Thank you.</s>BLITZER: Probably seemed like a great idea to see the sights, hundreds of feet in the air in a balloon until disaster struck. Up next, we'll have new pictures of the deadly explosion and a closer look at balloon safety.