VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — The Virginia Beach couple at the center of a Coast Guard search in the Atlantic Ocean are safely back at home – and they made it all on their own.
Sixty-eight-year-old Yanni Nikopoulos and 65-year-old Dale Evelyn Jones tied the knot just a few months ago. Their love for each other is only matched by their love of the sea.
“The ocean is in my soul, it’s in my blood,” Jones said. “We have a common love of sailboats so everything just kind of matched."
Jones has always lived close to the ocean while Nikopoulos said he was born on a sailboat. So it made sense that three weeks ago, the couple would set sail across the Atlantic on a trip to Europe.
On June 8, the couple left Hampton for Portugal, from Old Point Comfort Marina.
They packed six months’ worth of food and brought their 15-year-old Yorkshire terrier, Buddy, along for the ride. But things didn’t go as planned.
“The first storm started. Then, the second storm started. Then, a little bit of quiet," Nikopoulos said. "You know, we went through six storms, two of them were lightning storms.”
On June 13, five days after they left, the couple ran into trouble. Lightning struck their boat.
“All of a sudden it was like, ‘Bam!’ It threw my hands off the wheel and all the lights went out and I said, ‘Yanni, I think I need you!’” Jones said.
Their boat’s electrical system went out, their navigation and communication systems crashed, the food in the boat’s freezer was at imminent risk of going bad, and the strong winds shredded their headsail.
“Eventually, it was claimed by the ocean," Nikopoulos said. "The sail was gone.”
With no sail and no electricity, the couple only had one option: they turned back around.
“We have no communication, so there’s no point of another five weeks of going to Europe without any communication or knowing what to expect," Nikopoulos said. "Everything was destroyed.”
Meanwhile back on shore, after not hearing from them for a few days, their family contacted the Coast Guard on June 17, reporting them missing at sea. The couple’s plight grabbed headlines.
“It’s not only a national story," Nikopoulos said. "My son in Greece phoned us, he saw it on the news in Greece. He said, “What’s going on? I’m so worried.’”
The couple said at the time, they had no idea the Coast Guard might have been looking for them.
After a week-long search, the Coast Guard confirmed they found the couple safe on June 24, roughly 80 miles east of Chincoteague.
Nikopoulos said he rigged a V-H-F radio to make contact.
But throughout the ordeal, the couple never panicked and they didn’t need rescue. The Coast Guard found the couple sailing back to Virginia on their own. They rigged a sail that worked well enough to carry them all the way home.
“Not much scares me. I’m willing to try anything. I’ve always been a little bit of an adrenaline junkie, anyway," Jones joked. “I left here as a cruise ship passenger, and I came back a sailor.”
They said they’re already planning to try the trip again next year.
The Coast Guard said when they contacted the couple, the couple told them they were not in distress and did not need any assistance.