PORTSMOUTH

Coast Guard rescue crews came to the aid of tugboat crew members in two separate incidents Thursday night.

Both occurred shortly after 8 pm.

Petty Officer Mark Jones, a Coast Guard spokesman, said this afternoon that a crewmember of the tug vessel Ranger, identified as Carl Baum Jr., suffered a crushed hand while repositioning the anchor on a Skansa crane barge.

The accident happened near the second island of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel.

He was taken by other tug crew members, using a small boat, to the Coast Guard Station adjacent to the Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base. Coast Guard personnel there provided initial treatment until city paramedics arrived and took Baum to Sentara Bayside Hospital.

In the other case, a crewmember of the tug boat East Coast, identified as Donald A. Armond, was injured while the tug was towing the Mehmet Bey, a 738-foot bulk carrier barge.

The tug crew called the Coast Guard and the crew of Cutter Seahorse overheard the message and diverted to assist.

Petty Officer 3rd Class Melissa Landini, an emergency medical technician aboard the Seahorse, boarded the East Coast and  stabilized Armond until Portsmouth Fire Department fire boat arrived to carry Armond ashore where he was then taken to a local hospital.