{"id":194831,"date":"2026-03-17T11:53:28","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T11:53:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/194831\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T11:53:28","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T11:53:28","slug":"man-71-found-dead-on-ocean-floor-after-diving-to-see-florida-shipwreck-deputies-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/194831\/","title":{"rendered":"Man, 71, found dead on ocean floor after diving to see Florida shipwreck: deputies"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>ISLAMORADA, Fla. (WKRC) &#8211; A man was found dead on the ocean floor after diving to see a shipwreck off the coast of Florida.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/floridakeyssheriff\/posts\/pfbid0yzsFxzVJFfnRwUaXXxvHRYMZBCu2PFyNqq6DDTNiTfFz4pftLAs62S2jBnqrkUyFl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">According to a statement issued by the Monroe County Sheriff&#8217;s Office, <\/a>a 71-year-old Lonnie Lee Higgins of Columbia, Missouri was found dead on March 13 after he dove to the shipwreck &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/floridakeys.noaa.gov\/shipwrecktrail\/eagle.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Eagle<\/a>&#8221; off the coast of Islamorada, Florida.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"(Photo by Finnbarr Webster\/Getty Images,)\" class=\"ImageEmbed_image__qZBo_\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1773748408_397_66975a9c-57a1-4724-93f9-de30fd00933f-Florida1.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>(Photo by Finnbarr Webster\/Getty Images,)<\/p>\n<p>Authorities said Higgins was discovered on the ocean floor at a depth of around 110 feet by commercial dive employees. He was taken back to a commercial vessel, where CPR was performed, then continued after personnel with the U.S. Coast Guard arrived on the scene.<\/p>\n<p>Comment with Bubbles<\/p>\n<p>BE THE FIRST TO COMMENT<\/p>\n<p>Higgins was pronounced dead at Mariners Hospital in Tavernier. Authorities said foul play does not appear to be a factor, and autopsy results are pending.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ISLAMORADA, Fla. (WKRC) &#8211; A man was found dead on the ocean floor after diving to see a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":194818,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-194831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}