OGUNQUIT, Maine — August 28, 2013 — It’s been nearly a week since William “Billy Mac” McIntire, a well-known lifelong fisherman out of Perkins Cove, was last seen.
The Coast Guard called off an extensive search for McIntire Sunday. He has been missing since Aug. 22, when he went out on his boat, The Clover, with friends and jumped in the water about a mile off the shore of Perkins Cove. The Coast Guard said he became “distressed” and disappeared from sight.
Through days of searching with no sight of McIntire, 51, friends and family members kept vigil on the shore. This week they shared their memories of the man who lived in Cape Neddick section of York, saying he always kept them laughing.
Mark Walz, a senior photojournalist with CNN, recalled meeting McIntire while assigned to cover President George H.W. Bush’s Thanksgiving in Kennebunkport, shortly after he won the 1988 presidential election.
“It was my first time in K-Port, and while walking around the town I happened upon the Port Gardens bar which was the locals’ spot underneath the old Port Gardens Inn,” he said. “It was that night I met Billy Mac, ‘The Heart Attack’ McIntire. I got the impression that the ‘heart attack’ reference was his effect on the ladies. Billy Mac was quick to befriend myself and some other cameramen and introduced us around. I had the impression that Billy Mac was the ‘lord’ of the place, and definitely the largest personality in the bar. Rounds of shots were had, and a friendship was born.
“I loved hearing of his stories of harpooned giant tuna and later, he even invited me out on his boat with my television camera to shoot a story, though I couldn’t leave my responsibilities of covering the president. Over the next four years, our friendship grew, and I always looked up Billy Mac to hear of his latest adventures. I was saddened to hear of his passing, and it sounds like he gave his life to save another. That was Billy Mac.”
Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News