find help for two friends who had blood gushing from their heads after being thrown onto rocks in a boat crash.

But the Great Sound crash late on Monday night left 30-year-old Mr. Wayne (Bom-Bom) Swan dead and 15-year-old Anthony Johnson in surgery for head injuries for much of yesterday.

Mr. Swan, Anthony and Shannon were along with two others were tossed out of the 17-foot boat Ocean Arrow when it struck tiny Lambda Island, near Hawkins Island in the Great Sound.

Mr. Swan, the oldest in the group, was killed instantly. He had been out of prison barely a year.

It is understood he had been asleep in the back of the boat and broke his neck from the impact of the crash. Ocean Arrow landed in the middle of the island.

Shannon, 16, said he luckily landed on his feet. But his friend Anthony suffered a gash to his head and he believed Mr. Swan was unconscious.

Anthony was in the operating room most of yesterday, but was last night listed in stable condition.

Shannon said he decided to swim to Hawkins Island because he knew Anthony and Mr. Swan were badly hurt.

"I knew I had to get help,'' he said. "I just swam until I made it.'' When he reached Hawkins Island, he broke into a building in hopes of finding a telephone.

He found a marine radio instead and managed to get through to Harbour Radio, which sent for Marine Police and ambulances.

Meanwhile, Kirk Wade, the owner of the boat, and Gregory Talbot, who had been driving it, sent off two flares, which were seen by Harbour Radio.

"We sent out a vessel, but nothing of note was seen,'' a Harbour Radio spokesman said yesterday.

But at about 2 a.m., the spokesman said a Harbour Radio operator received a call from "distraught'' Shannon saying he and his friends had crashed their boat.

Shannon said the group, who all live around Devil's Hole in Smith's Parish, were trying to catch up with a cruise boat when they crashed at about 1 a.m.

Kirk said yesterday he had also been asleep in the back of the boat at the time. Gregory Talbot, 16, was driving the boat, Shannon said.

Shannon said neither Gregory, nor the rest of the group were drunk. "We just didn't see the rocks,'' he said. "It was very dark. Everything happened so fast.'' Shannon said Gregory spent most of yesterday at the Police Station being questioned by Police. Spokesman Sgt. John Dale said the youth was assisting Police with their inquiries.

He said he "was not in a position'' to say whether drinking and driving is suspected or whether any of the teenagers will be charged with an offence.

He said Mr. Swan was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital and a report is being forwarded to the Coroner.

An inquest into Mr. Swan's death is likely.

Mr. Swan was jailed for 10 years in 1985 after being found guilty along with four others of brutally attacking narcotics detective Sgt. Patrick Hamlett in his Devil's Hole home in 1984.

Mr. Swan and the four men had busted into Sgt. Hamlett's apartment wielding clubs and knives. They left him on the floor badly beaten and bleeding.

HIGH AND DRY -- Marine Police try and remove the boat which crashed on Lambda Island in the Great Sound, resulting in the death of 30-year-old Wayne Swan of Smith's Parish and serious injuries to a teenager.*l