One noteworthy point is  that the captain has a real government-issued license.  I guess the lesson here is that a licensed captain in an extremely stable vessel doesn't guarantee that the boat will stay afloat.

I find it interesting that no one has commented on Mr. Benford's assertion that that entire sinking incident is based on rumor.  Apparently no sunken  boat has been found and no referenced factual reports (TV, newspaper, police, or Coast Guard) been produced.  The entire incident seems to be of the "have you heard about the boat that sank?" type of word of mouth.  I spent a little time googling for a report on this and came up empty.  Gamekeeper was the only person to even ask for facts before making any decisions and he deserves an attaboy for it.

If Quentin's story of a boat rolling excessively because of passengers moving from side to side is true, my first reaction is that the boat was seriously overloaded, not that the boat was inherently unstable.   But then I'm not the type of person to blame the designer, the manufacturer, the dealer, the salesperson, and everyone else for my stupid mistakes.  (I'm not questioning your telling of the story, Quentin, but you did hear it second hand...you didn't see it yourself so we can only hope your source is accurate.) 

There haven't been many facts presented in this thread.  Only impressions, feelings, thoughts, and second-hand rumor.  Making disparaging conclusions of a boats sea-worthiness based on how it looks is intellectually dishonest.  And a bunch of well educated techie types should well know that form does not necessarily follow function.  (It's nice when it does, though.)

I saw this thread when it first came on the board. Since I have a 55' Florida Bay Coaster for sale right outside my office ( I can see it out my window) I have a little more interest then others. I did some Google research and could not find anything. I found other incidents from around the world, and I know it is always big news in the local papers and TV websites when anything happens like a sinking boat here in the Boating Capital of the US.

So the next day I called Jay Benford to ask what he could tell me. He told me he was "skeptical." I also wondered how a salvage company could not find a boat like that in the relatively shallow waters of a bay.  I told him about the post here on this message board and suggested he might post a reply.  I am glad to see he has added his comments here. I too, would like to find out more about this story.

To clarify: the captain and owner of the vessel and her family are friends of mine and she is a member of my yacht club.  I didn't just "hear this from somebody's uncle's cousin's sister's best friend's daughter-in-law."  She told me that the boat sank in the Chesapeake after they were caught in a storm and nailed by wind and waves.  Suddenly, the boat went sideways, there was a crashing sound, and the boat quickly filled with water.  The son saved their lives by opening the pilothouse door, something that the parents were apparently unable to do.  I have no additional particulars about why the parents couldn't open the door, but can ask the next time I see my friends.  I do know, however, that the club is discussing bestowing on the son some sort of decoration for heroism.  Ironically, the watertight doors were dogged closed because of the storm.  This may be an instance where a serious piece of marine hardware generally favored by blue water types like FF might have cost them their lives had the son not been present.  That observation (minus the FF part, for the nitpickers among us. lol) was made by the captain, btw.

After the captain left the vessel, it sank very quickly.  The cats were lost.  The sailing dinghy floated free after the boat fell over but it was still in the vicinity when the mothership sank.  Irony Number 2: not fully securing the sailing dinghy prior to the storm provided them with a lifeboat of sorts when the boat went down.  They climbed aboard the dinghy and were picked up by somebody responding to the mayday that the son broadcast minutes before the boat sank.

The Army Corps of Engineers was unable to find the boat, but the captain says they were mostly concerned that it wasn't clogging up the shipping channel.  The shipping channel in that area has more than 100' or so of depth; the captain said they were in 30' or so of water the last time she recalls looking at the sounder.  The last news I heard was that the boat has not been recovered.  The captain and her family gave up their slip at the club though.  As a friend of the family, I can't take seriously any speculation that the boat didn't actually sink.