Police will continue the search for a second man lost overboard in a fishing boat accident off Sydney Harbour on Thursday, but say they do not believe he could have survived.
The body of the art dealer Tim Klingender, 59, was found on Thursday, after his borrowed fishing boat was discovered overturned and broken up on the rocks at the base of The Gap off South Head, near the entrance to Sydney Harbour.
Police were still searching for the second man believed to have been on board the boat, understood to be 51-year-old Andrew Findlay.
Neither man was wearing a lifejacket when their RHIB fishing boat was capsized by large swells close to the cliffs off South Head, police said.
On Saturday, Supt Joe McNulty described the crash in heavy seas as “a tragic accident we believe could have been avoided”.
“Both men were not wearing lifejackets,” McNulty said. “It’s a terrible message to share with you today that lifejackets save lives. Both men failed to have a lifejacket on. And I’m sorry to say that those lives are lost.”
McNulty said the “timeframe for survival for anyone in the water” lapsed on Friday, given the sea conditions and the water temperature off Sydney in July.
“That lapsed yesterday, but we’ve continued to search for another day. We will continue to search, but are a much lower scale looking for that … body because we presume now that he is deceased.”
The search resumed at 8am Saturday, with specialist police resources – assisted by the Westpac Rescue Helicopter, Surf Life Saving NSW and Marine Rescue NSW – searching an area from South Head to Cape Solander. The search area also extended about five nautical miles, about 9km, out to sea.
While only one body had been recovered, police said they were certain there were two men on board the boat.
“We have confirmed that that second person was on board. We’ve seen vision of that,” McNulty said.
The men were experienced anglers, and had taken the boat down to Bondi having left Sydney Harbour at about 7.30am Thursday morning, he said. They then turned back north, trolling close to the cliffs.
“They were fishing with their fishing rods and lures out the back, coming along … the cliff face at the bottom. And it appears that they’ve gone over a bombora and been swept by a large wave that has possibly capsized the vessel and thrown both men into the ocean.”
McNulty said the boat was seaworthy and the men were experienced, but swells of up to five metres, close to rock shelfs, overwhelmed the vessel. The vessel was found jammed up into a crevice at the base of the cliff.
“That vessel was too close to the cliff face in those conditions … it was a violent sea condition. It was a violent accident that’s occurred under South Head.”
McNulty said police detectives from the marine area command had been in close contact with the men’s family’s over the last three days.
“They’re in shock, a lot of shock, a lot of sadness, because they understand that this is an avoidable accident.”
Klingender, a respected expert in First Nations art and father of two teenage children, was the senior consultant for Australian art at international auction house Sotheby’s, which became Smith & Singer in Australia in 2019.
He was pivotal in bringing Australian First Nations arts to the attention of a global audience and a global market.
Findlay was a tech entrepreneur and father of three small children.
