Eco-friendly coffee boat believed sunk

By Rhiannon Meyers
The (Galveston) Daily News

Published January 12, 2008
GALVESTON — Somewhere in the murky bottom of the Gulf of Mexico lies nearly 4,000 pounds of coffee that Joe and Terry Butcher had spent the past two years saving to buy.

After Joe, Terry and Doug Butcher were rescued from their sinking sailboat Red Cloud on New Year’s Day, they vowed to return to salvage the boat and the coffee onboard so they could sell it for a profit. But, last week, they tracked the boat’s beacon hundreds of miles offshore and found nothing but open water. They assume the Red Cloud has sunk, Terry Butcher said.

“Our life savings and investment was in the boat,” she said. “It was our home and business.”

Joe and Terry Butcher, owners of El Lago Coffee Co., along with Joe’s brother, Douglas Butcher, had planned to ship the coffee from San Pedro on Ambergris Caye in Belize to Galveston Bay to promote eco-friendly coffee trading.

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