Yacht damaged when smaller boat catches fire

Officials: Blaze at Fort Lauderdale marina started on fuel dock

FORT LAUDERDALE — Smoke and the sound of sirens filled the air Sunday after a 20-foot boat caught fire just before 11 a.m. at the Bahia Mar marina in Fort Lauderdale.

Nearly 20 firefighters were called to battle the blaze at the Bahia Mar marina at 801

Seabreeze Blvd., Battalion Chief Stephen Gollan said.

Someone might have been gassing up the boat when it caught fire.

“It was taking on fuel at the time, I believe,” Gollan said. “I don’t know that for sure. But it was on the fuel dock.”

The blazing boat floated up against a 200-foot yacht, causing damage to the bow, Gollan said.

Chad McCoury, who lives less than a mile north, knew something was amiss when he heard the shrill sound of sirens passing by his fifthfloor condo.

“There were tons of fire trucks going by,” he said. “Then I looked out and saw the billowing smoke.”

His cat had been napping on the balcony but came racing back into the house as the firetrucks whizzed by.

“I assumed seeing all the black smoke and where it was coming from that it was a boat,” McCoury said. “I could even smell it.”

Andrew Robbins was sipping his morning coffee from his 11th-floor condo at the nearby Venetian when his wife called him over to the window.

“All of a sudden there was thick dark smoke coming up,” he said. “My wife called me over and said, ‘Look at this.’ We were kind of tripping out thinking it was a really big yacht.”

It was the second fire of the day for the Fort Lauderdale Fire-Rescue Department.

“We had a house fire this morning,” Gollan said.

The fire broke out around 8 a.m. at a house in the 800 block of Northeast 17 Court.

A cat inside the house died. No one else was injured but the house was totaled, Gollan said.

COURTESY Firefighters were called to battle a blaze when a boat caught fire Sunday morning at the Bahia Mar marina at 801 Seabreeze Blvd. in Fort Lauderdale.