Sabotage Attempt on DAY PECKINPAUGH

Police in Waterford, New York have charged a former New York state employee with criminal mischief and grand larceny after he stole a state vehicle and opened sea valves in an attempt to flood and sink state museum and former Erie Navigation Company cement carrier DAY PECKINPAUGH.

Guy Pucci, a maintenance worker on the PECKINPAUGH who was fired on February 25, was charged after employees arriving at work on Monday discovered the 89-year-old PECKINPAUGH sitting lower in the water than normal and called police. An investigation proved that the sea valves on the vessel had been left open and it was sitting several feet lower in the water than normal. Crews were able to pump the vessel out, and police arrested Pucci and are holding him on $5,000 bond in the Waterford jail.

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DAY PECKINPAUGH laid up in Erie on May 5, 2005, barely two months before leaving to become a museum.