Stuck sailboat knocks out power from Key West to Big Pine
A sailboat stuck in transmission lines off the Florida Keys Monday morning zapped power to the lower half of the island chain.
The vessel hit the electricity lines shortly before 9:30 a.m. about a half mile north of the Seven Mile Bridge, said Julio Torrado, spokesman for Keys Energy Services, the utility that provides electricity to customers from Big Pine Key to Key West.
Torrado said about 30,000 customers lost power. The utility said on its Facebook page that the boat would have to be removed from the transmission lines before power could be restored.
Around 10:30 a.m., the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office issued an alert stating the city of Marathon Fire Rescue department was in the process of removing the people from the sailboat. It was not immediately clear if anyone was injured.
By about 11 a.m., some customers began receiving power again, Torrado said.
“We have since fired up the transmission line and are switching over the transmission power,” he said at about 11:50 a.m. “Every affected customer should have power now with a few exceptions.”
The sailboat, which the Coast Guard said measured 32 feet long, was no longer in the transmission lines but it remained in the area, Torrado said.
“I’ve been told they have secured the sailboat to the side of the bridge until it’s determined how it can be removed,” he said. “It’s kind of locked in. They can’t really tow it anywhere without it hitting the lines again.”
The Florida Keys Electric Cooperative, which services about 33,000 homes and businesses from the Monroe County line to the northern end of the Seven Mile Bridge, did not experience outages, said Nikki Dunn Cullen, spokeswoman for the utility.
Between the rescue operation and utility workers inspecting lines that run parallel to the Seven Mile Bridge, traffic had heavy delays Monday near and along the iconic span.
A similar incident involving a sailboat hitting transmission lines next to the Seven Mile Bridge happened in October 2018, knocking out power to about 30,000 homes.
Video of previous incident in 2018:
This story was originally published April 12, 2021 at 10:48 AM with the headline "Stuck sailboat knocks out power from Key West to Big Pine."
