U.S. Coast Guard intercepts boat carrying 309 Haitians
U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Valiant and Legares' crews repatriated 309 Haitians to Haiti after intercepting the boat off Florida's coast.
A small vessel carrying over 100 Haitian migrants landed on a beach in the Florida Keys early Thursday, the latest of such landings to occur in the state amid a surge of similar dangerous voyages, officials said.
The migrant vessel landed in Tavernier on Key Largo, the largest island in the upper Keys, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said.
Border Patrol agents and other law enforcement agencies found 114 Haitian migrants at the scene, officials said. Local EMS personnel were conducting medical screenings on the migrants.
Officials shared images of the migrants gathered on the beach and of their apparent vessel, which appeared small and in poor condition. Border officials warned that these voyages are dangerous.
It was unclear where the migrants had set off from. Border Patrol officials said the migrants were being transferred to a local Border Patrol station for processing.
The 114 Haitian migrants were given medical screening after their vessel landed on a beach in Tavernier, Florida, on Thursday. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection AMO)
CBP told FOX News Digital that more information would be released as it becomes available.
Officials shared the above photo of the vessel after encountering the 114 Haitian migrants in the Florida Keys. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection AMO)
The number of migrants attempting to reach Florida by boat has skyrocketed in the past year.
The Coast Guard interdicted over 6,000 Cubans and over 7,000 Haitians in 2022 compared to over 800 Cubans and over 1,500 Haitians in 2021. The agency does not have numbers on the number of vessels it encounters.
Last month, the Coast Guard detained a 50-foot boat crammed with nearly 400 Haitian migrants near the remote Cay Sal Bank, an island located between Florida and Cuba.
Bahamian officials said at the time that those migrants would be processed on the Bahamian island of Inagua and repatriated to Haiti.
The United Nations’ Missing Migrants Project estimates that 305 Cubans and 380 Haitians have disappeared or died in the Caribbean region since 2014, when the agency began tracking them. The agency uses a combination of official sources, interviews with family members and news stories to put together its database.
Meanwhile, Florida has had to deal with the costly removal of migrant vessels discovered abandoned on its shores.
OVER QUARTER OF A MILLION MIGRANT ENCOUNTERS IN DECEMBER ALONE
The Florida Division of Emergency Management announced on Jan. 13 that it had removed 40 migrant vessels in the Florida Keys and identified another 250 for removal.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission removes more derelict vessels from Monroe County, where the Keys are located, each year than any other area of the state, the agency said in 2022.
The cost of removing a single vessel can reach the tens of thousands, officials have said, depending on the boat’s location and condition. Florida has ramped up its spending on the removals, allocating over $8 million in 2022, a $5 million increase from 2021.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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