A 70-foot Viking yacht from St. Petersburg, Florida caught fire just after midnight on July 26 while docked at The Oasis Marina, behind The Perry Hotel on Stock Island.
Two men, ages 58 and 21, escaped the fire, but one female victim, 51, did not make it out, according to Monroe County Sheriff Rick Ramsay and Sgt. Tyler Blanton, who was on scene.
The two men were airlifted to Ryder Trauma Center in Miami with burns.
As of 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, July 26, the Sheriff’s Office divers were searching for the woman inside the vessel. The St. Petersburg, Florida family was in the Florida Keys for lobster mini-season. Another family of four also on the boat escaped uninjured, according to the sheriff’s office.
The boat was engulfed in flames when Monroe County Fire Rescue crews arrived shortly after midnight on Wednesday. They battled the blaze for approximately three hours.
The Sheriff’s Office Dive Team and TowBoat U.S. crews are assisting in the search for the woman while negotiating hazardous conditions where the vessel sank in the marina.
The state Fire Marshal’s Office and Sheriff’s Office Major Crimes Detectives are investigating. The cause of the fire is part of that investigation.
