on Thursday to rescue a family of four aboard a 64-foot sailboat en route to Bermuda from Norfolk, Virginia.

The vessel began taking on water 410 miles off the Virginia coast.

"I'm so thirsty I could drop,'' said Mario Vittone, the swimmer who helped the family escape the Marine Flower II .

Vittone said all he could see most of the time were walls of water. "It wasn't so bad when you were on top of the wave, I could see the boat, otherwise ...,'' he said.

Rescued were Ira Hubbard, 49; his wife, Flora Ruiz, 39; a four-month-old son; and a 13-year-old daughter. They live in Colombia.

Hurricane Gordon was yesterday downgraded to a tropical storm.