'It was horrific': Eyewitness speaks about helping survivors of California dive boat fire

The burned hull of the Conception is brought to the surface by a salvage team, Thursday, Sept. 12, 2019, off Santa Cruz Island, Calif., in the Santa Barbara Channel in Southern California The vessel burned and sank on Sept. 2, taking the lives of 34 people aboard. Five survived. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times via AP) less The burned hull of the Conception is brought to the surface by a salvage team, Thursday, Sept. 12, 2019, off Santa Cruz Island, Calif., in the Santa Barbara Channel in Southern California The vessel burned and ... more Photo: Brian Van Der Brug / Associated Press Photo: Brian Van Der Brug / Associated Press Image 1 of / 33 Caption Close 'It was horrific': Eyewitness speaks about helping survivors of California dive boat fire 1 / 33 Back to Gallery

The couple aboard a good Samaritan boat that came to the aid of the dive boat that burst into flames Monday morning spoke to the Los Angeles Times about their harrowing experience.

Shirley and Bob Hansen were asleep on their fishing boat, the Grape Escape, off Santa Cruz Island when they were awoken by banging on the hull at 3:30 a.m.

"It was horrific, the pounding," Shirley Hansen told the Times. "Our boat is very well made. Having that sound come through [showed] they were very in need of help."

Five crew members in a dinghy were hauled onto the Grape Escape. According the Coast Guard, the crew had been above deck when a fire broke out on the Conception, an excursion vessel chartered to take scuba divers to the Northern Channel Islands. They were able to jump to safety.

Thirty-four passengers are believed to have been trapped below deck in the boat's sleeping quarters. Four bodies have been recovered, and another four were spotted by dive teams on the ocean floor. Dive teams have not yet been able to enter the boat itself, which is unstable.

MORE: What we know about the Santa Cruz Island boat fire disaster

Hansen said the crew was distraught and one man said his girlfriend was still onboard. Another said they had just been celebrating three visitors' birthdays, including that of a 17-year-old girl.

"I could see the fire coming through holes on the side of the boat. There were these explosions every few beats. You can't prepare yourself for that. It was horrendous," Bob Hansen told the New York Times.

"The fire was too big, there was absolutely nothing we could do," he added.

The commercial scuba diving vessel Conception was on a three-day Labor Day excursion. The trip afforded divers the opportunity to visit the Northern Channel Islands off the Santa Barbara coast.

The boat is owned by Truth Aquatics, based in Santa Barbara, but was chartered by Worldwide Diving Adventures, a Santa Cruz-based company that provides "exotic dive trips, scuba instruction, and local boat diving in Monterey and the Channel Islands."

Katie Dowd is an SFGATE Senior Digital Editor. Contact: katie.dowd@sfgate.com | Twitter: @katiedowd