San Diego

A fisherman bitten to the bone by a wahoo south of Baja California was picked up from a Mexican island by a U.S. Coast Guard jet Sunday to be flown to a San Diego hospital, the agency reported.

Lou Wiezai of Fountain Valley was suffering deep cuts after the 50- to 100-pound wahoo, described as a cross between a mackerel, a tuna and a barracuda, bit him in the left forearm, Lt. Mike Parks at the U.S. Coast Guard’s Long Beach Rescue Control Center said.

Wiezai was reaching for his lure, after reeling in his line, when the sharp-toothed fish jumped out of the water and grabbed his arm, Parks said.

The Falcon jet rescued Wiezai about 5:30 p.m. from Socorro Island, about 200 miles south of Cabo San Lucas and about 1,000 miles south of San Diego. The jet was to have returned to San Diego just late Sunday and Wiezai was to be transported to the Navy Hospital in Balboa Park, a Coast Guard spokesman said.

The small island contains a Mexican military installation, but it does not have adequate facilities to treat the injury. Wiezai was on a recreational fishing trip on the 92-foot charter boat Royal Star out of San Diego’s Fisherman’s Landing.