Last Voyage of the Relentless

Friends and family of a well-known fishing captain are convinced he and his deckhand were victims of a maritime hit-and-run near the Golden Gate

A A A Comments By Ron Russell Wednesday, Oct 11 2006

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Meanwhile, Patti Pennisi, Rowdy's widow, says she doubts she will have peace unless or until the wreckage is found.

"It eats at you every day when your loved one is lost at sea and the answers about what happened don't add up." She and the couple's son moved to the Sierra foothills near Sonora after the tragedy, in part, she says, "because I couldn't stand to even look at the ocean as long as Rowdy is missing out there."

Rowdy Pennisi in front of the Relentless, which his brother says was Pennisi's "pride and joy."

Rowdy Pennisi, wife Patti, and son Joey, now 11, in a photo taken shortly before the Relentless went missing.

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She sees the tragedy's human toll in her son's eyes.

"He worshiped his father," she says, pulling a scrap of paper from the boy's loose-leaf diary, begun after Rowdy Pennisi went missing.

"I love you so much I don't feel good," the boy wrote of his father. "In the morning when I wake up, I look for my daddy but he's not there. Then I remember."