Eight Die as Boat Carrying Cubans Capsizes in Atlantic

A boat carrying Cubans capsized in the choppy Atlantic, killing eight people and leaving at least four missing Friday in what investigators said appeared to be the deadliest immigrant-smuggling attempt ever off the Florida coast.

The 30-foot boat went down Thursday off Elliott Key, about 30 miles from Miami, in waves up to 6 feet. At least 21 people were aboard.

A freighter rescued nine people, including at least two children. The survivors hung on to the overturned vessel for about 10 hours after the accident, Coast Guard Petty Officer Scott Carr said.

The Guard pulled eight bodies from the water Friday and continued to search for the missing.

The boat was registered in Florida, meaning it may have been operated by smugglers who charged the Cubans to take them to the United States, Carr said. The Border Patrol identified two of the survivors as smuggling suspects.

“We have no record of any smuggling episode with a higher fatality rate” in waters stretching from Key West to the Carolinas, said Daniel Geoghegan, an assistant chief with the Border Patrol.

About 15 relatives waited outside the Coast Guard base at Miami Beach as four hearses carried bodies away.

The relatives said their family members had been missing in Cuba for about a week.

Since a 1995 change in U.S. policy, Cubans intercepted at sea routinely are returned to their Caribbean homeland, which is about 90 miles from Key West. About 927 Cuban refugees were rescued off South Florida in the last 11 months.

Four times as many Cubans were smuggled into the United States in 1998 as in the year before.

Refugee smuggling carries a maximum penalty of three years in prison. Refugee smuggling that results in death is punishable by death.