STOCK ISLAND, Fla. – A 51-year-old St. Petersburg woman was presumed dead Wednesday after a fire erupted overnight on a yacht that was docked outside the Perry Hotel and Marina on Stock Island.
Authorities spent Wednesday searching for the woman following the blaze, which broke out just after midnight at the marina, located at 7101 Shrimp Road. They identified her Wednesday evening as Linda Vella.
According to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office, Vella was on the 70-foot Viking yacht with her husband and son, aged 58 and 21 respectively, who escaped the fire and were taken to a hospital in Miami-Dade County.
Monroe County’s fire chief said the men were taken by ambulance to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Miami Burn Center.
MCSO spokesperson Adam Linhardt said the missing woman and her family were visiting the Florida Keys for lobster mini-season. Another family of four escaped the vessel unharmed, he said.
Monroe County Fire Rescue crews battled the fire overnight and MCSO deputies also responded to the scene. Officials confirmed that the yacht sank at the dock.
MCSO divers and TowBoatUS crews searched for the woman “while negotiating hazardous conditions where the vessel sank in the marina,” Linhardt said. He said the search continued into Wednesday evening.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation by MCSO detectives and the state fire marshal’s office, Linhardt said.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect that the patients were transported by ambulance, rather than by helicopter as authorities initially reported.