Two Coast Guardsmen received top medals Friday for the daring rescue of a father and son off a stricken sailboat in near hurricane conditions.
Petty Officer 3rd Class Evan Staph received the Distinguished Flying Cross, becoming the 144th recipient in Coast Guard history, and Petty Officer 2nd Class Derrick P. Suba received the Air Medal.
Their MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter flew from Coast Guard Station Cape Cod through limited visibility and hurricane-force winds to locate the distressed mariners south of Nantucket in February 2015.
They airlifted the father and son off the disabled sail boat, which was then adrift in 25-foot-high seas 150 miles south of Nantucket.
"Our purpose was to get them home," Suba said, according to a Coast Guard release Friday. "We kept going to make sure we got them home."
