Coast Guard searches for 16 missing people off Florida coast

The U.S. Coast Guard is searching for 16 people from two boats off the coast of Florida. Photo via U.S. Coast Guard Southeast/Twitter
The U.S. Coast Guard is searching for 16 people from two boats off the coast of Florida. Photo via U.S. Coast Guard Southeast/Twitter

Feb. 13 (UPI) -- The U.S. Coast Guard is search for 16 people missing off the coast of Florida.

One boat capsized and one went missing this week, officials said.

On Friday a man was rescued by a good Samaritan 23 miles off the coast of Fort Pierce, USCG Southeast said in a Friday press release.

The Coast Guard took the man, a Jamaican national, to the hospital.

The man told the Coast Guard his boat had departed from Bimini, Bahamas, and had capsized two days before. Six others who were traveling on the boat remain missing.

A second boat, described as a "six-foot makeshift vessel" carrying 10 people who departed Havana, Cuba, Friday, has also gone missing, according to the Coast Guard.

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