By The Associated Press

Published: Thursday, November 15, 2012, 11:08 a.m.
Updated: Thursday, November 15, 2012

OCEAN ISLE BEACH, N.C. — The captain who operated the boat in the parasailing accident that killed two women along Ocean Isle Beach has pleaded guilty to maritime negligence.

The U.S. Justice Department said that 45-year-old Thomas Povazan of West Mifflin pleaded guilty Wednesday. Povazan was accused of failing to check the weather before taking his clients out on the ocean.

Sixty-year-old Cynthia Woodcock of Kernersville and 45-year-old Lorrie Shoup of Granby, Colo., were killed in August 2009.

Authorities say a strong gust of wind blew up while they were in the air, snapping the line connecting their parasail to the tow boat Tied High. The wind then slammed the women into the ocean and dragged them toward the town's fishing pier.

The women died from blunt force trauma.

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