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'We All Have a Personal Connection' - Dockside Memorial Grows for California
Boat Fire Victims

Reuters

   SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA - Members of the close-knit Santa Barbara
   boating community gathered on Tuesday to construct a makeshift memorial
   to the 34 people believed to have perished when their dive boat caught
   fire and sank off the California coast.

   As of Tuesday, 20 badly burned bodies had been recovered from wreckage
   of the Conception, which caught fire near Santa Cruz Island early on
   Monday, and officials say they expect 14 other people died in the
   fast-moving blaze.

   "Almost everyone, because we are right on the water here, has been out
   on (the Conception). We all have a personal connection with it," said
   Judy Weisman, 72, as she visited the growing memorial of flowers,
   candles and pictures at the boat's dock.

   "It's just such a horrific notion to think what the people down in the
   below decks, the people sleeping down there must have gone through,"
   Weisman said. "How terrifying."

   Only five people are known to have survived the fast-moving flames, the
   boat's captain and four crew members who were above deck and escaped on
   an inflatable boat after jumping off the Conception. The single crew
   member who did not survive may have been sleeping below deck with the
   passengers at the time.

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