{"id":234297,"date":"2026-04-16T14:35:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T14:35:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/234297\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T14:35:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T14:35:15","slug":"florida-couple-rescued-after-boat-drifts-away-forced-to-swim-1-5-miles-to-buoy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/234297\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida couple rescued after boat drifts away, forced to swim 1.5 miles to buoy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">A couple was rescued near Boca Grande after their boat drifted away while they were diving.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">They were forced to swim to a buoy more than 1.5 miles offshore and used a small flashlight to signal for help.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The couple began swimming on their backs and fought strong waves after realizing their boat was gone.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Fire crews rescued them after a 911 caller spotted their flashing light in the distance.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The couple believes their anchor failed, which caused their boat to drift away.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">After reaching the buoy, they were able to tie a flashlight around themselves and shined it toward other boaters to attract attention.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.wftv.com\/mobile-apps\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Click here;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Click here&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Click here<\/a> to download our free news, weather and smart TV apps. And <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wftv.com\/video\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:click here;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;click here&quot;}\" class=\"link \">click here<\/a> to stream Channel 9 Eyewitness News live.<\/p>\n<p><a data-ylk=\"ct:story;elm:img;itc:0;\" class=\"stretched-box\" href=\"https:\/\/wftvapps.com\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\"><img alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"537\" height=\"108\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"rounded-lg\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/beda08358d6db9816e7b0d066edd22cf.jpeg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A couple was rescued near Boca Grande after their boat drifted away while they were diving. They were&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":234298,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[21038,28,30,29],"class_list":{"0":"post-234297","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-boca-grande","9":"tag-florida","10":"tag-florida-headlines","11":"tag-florida-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234297","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=234297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234297\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/234298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}