Families 'torn apart' after boat en route to wedding capsizes off Quebec's Lower North Shore

Two people are dead, and three others are in hospital after their boat capsized off the shores of Vieux-Fort, 1,100 kilometres northeast of Quebec City, leaving them at sea for more than three hours. 

The first call to the Coast Guard was dispatched at around 4:20 p.m. Thursday, when a private zodiac came upon three people in the water about 500 metres from shore, said spokesperson Pascale Fortin. 

But Fortin said the boat had flipped at around 1:30 p.m. as the group of five were on their way to a wedding in Saint-Augustin, roughly 150 kilometres southwest of Blanc-Sablon.

"It's a long time, a long time to be in the water," Fortin said. 

They were all rushed to hospital, but one of the first three to be dragged out of the water was already dead and the last person to be pulled out by a helicopter two hours later died, too. 

One was a man from Blanc-Sablon, Que., and the other, a woman from L'Anse-au-Clair, N.L.

Blanc-Sablon's mayor Armand Joncas said the water would have been cold and choppy, with waves reaching two to three metres that day. He said the boat flipped when one hit it.

"Everyone was thrown into the water," he told CBC News, describing a harrowing accident that left the five in the water, fighting for their lives despite their experience on it. 

Fortin said things probably happened so fast they didn't have time to send a distress signal.

Several nearby residents, some of them Coast guard volunteers, joined the effort of searching for the two others left stranded, but they were found separately only two hours later.

The fourth, rescued by local fishermen at around 6:10 p.m., remains in hospital and the fifth was found by a military Cormorant helicopter 20 minutes later, but it was too late, Fortin said. 

Two families were torn apart today and it makes a big effect in the community.- Armand Joncas, mayor of Blanc-Sablon

The mayor of Blanc-Sablon, Armand Joncas, knows the group and said those who died were "really active in the community."

Blanc-Sablon is a tight-knit village without roads connecting it to some other municipalities along the Lower North Shore, he said, so "when people want to move from one village to another, the only choice that they got is to travel by boat."

"Two families were torn apart today and it makes a big effect in the community," Joncas said.

In a sign of public mourning, local restaurant The Anchor posted on its Facebook page, saying it was cancelling its pub night for the evening and closing early. 

"We send sincere condolences to all families and friends. Our thoughts are with you all during this sad time," it wrote.

Area known for its 'strange waves'

Residents of Quebec's Lower North Shore, an area dotted with small communities, are heavily dependent on maritime travel.

Several communities are not accessible by road, and residents rely mainly on travel by sea in the summer, and snowmobile in winter.

The man from Blanc-Sablon who died was considered an experienced seaman, said Joncas.

The area where the boat capsized is difficult to navigate because it is where three rivers spill into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, he added.

"It's a bit dangerous with the southwest winds, especially at low tide, because the current coming from the river and the wind are going in opposite directions and it creates strange waves," Joncas said.

He said the town has been asking the provincial government to build a road between it and Saint-Augustin, where the boat was headed, for more than a century because of the dangerous waters between the two.

"Every time we lose a life … it's like a thousand people somewhere else. Everybody knows one another, it affects everybody," he said.

Police said they do not suspect any criminal element in connection to the accident.