When June Smith lost her 13-year-old daughter, Harlie Smith, in a boat crash off of Cudjoe Key in 2017, she said she didn’t realize how unprepared they would be in an emergency, according to reporting from WSVN Miami.
“We’ve spent many years down in the Keys and that day, when I needed help, I didn’t realize you are helpless,” she said.
Harlie, who her mother described to WSVN reporters as an outgoing, happy child who loved the ocean, was in the water on Aug. 11, 2017, when a boat propeller hit her, causing a severe laceration to her leg. The boat, a 2017 Boston Whaler, was driven by Harlie’s father who did not know his daughter was behind him when he put the boat into reverse, according to previous reporting by local news outlets.
Smith described calling emergency agencies for help that day but said all she got as an answer was “come to shore.”
Another boat brought the Smiths’ daughter to shore and she was taken to the Lower Keys Medical Center for treatment where she tragically died.
“If that man wasn’t there that day … we would have been stranded a couple miles from shore indefinitely,” Smith said about the ordeal on the organization’s website. “USCG would have got to us eventually…but their station was too far away!“
In the years since Harlie’s death, her mother started the Heart Like Harlie organization to try and fight for change in Monroe County. Emergency response boats to help people who have been injured on the water are next to nonexistent in the Florida Keys, according to the organization’s website.
R.L Colina, a Deputy Fire Chief with the Monroe County Fire Department, told WSVN that they are aware of the problem and have been working toward a solution for “probably about two years.”
Smith described emergency responders as waiting for her and her family to arrive to shore and said the experience of trying to get their daughter to paramedics was a traumatizing one.
“Our plan and wish is that no other family should ever have to feel so helpless and go through the terror we did that day in the Florida Keys,” she said.
Sadly, her story is not an isolated one.
Leesfield & Partners
Leesfield & Partners attorneys have witnessed the immeasurable grief and havoc that injuries sustained on the water can have for clients and their loved ones. With offices in Miami-Dade County, Key West and Orlando, areas in Florida that millions of tourists flock to every year, attorneys with the firm have helped guide clients through devastating and life-altering injuries and wrongful death cases.
Attorneys with the firm secured a $1.7 million award for a family whose lives were forever changed by a reckless middle schooler operating a boat that killed their father. The man was diving and had divers-down flags in the area to alert passing boats to his presence.
Under Florida law, boaters are required to keep a 300-foot distance from divers in open water and a 100-foot distance from them when in rivers, inlets and navigational channels. They must also slow to idle speed. The teen boater did not and attempted to flee the scene after he hit the man. Neighbors testified that they had witnessed the teen driving recklessly in the past.
Another family represented by the firm whose loved one tragically died as a result of a negligent boater received an over $1 million settlement amount with multiple defendants. The woman was killed after the speedboat she was on crashed into a concrete dock at night. The person operating the boat was drinking the night she died.
Recent Incidents
In the latest available data from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, numbers showed that July is the month for the majority of accidents and injuries on the water. Monroe County had the highest accident rate with Miami-Dade County following closely behind.
Florida leads the nation with approximately 1,035,911 registered vessels recorded in 2023, according to the FWC report. Monroe County had about 87 total accidents in 2023 resulting in 62 injuries and three fatalities.
Over the Fourth of July weekend, there were three separate, back-to-back incidents reported on the water that injured at least eight people and killed one other person. In one of the incidents, a 12-year-old boy and two others had to be airlifted to a hospital for treatment.
On July 14, a crash involving a 42-foot boat and a jet ski resulted in the death of at least one person.
A woman in Central Florida was killed after she went overboard on a Pontoon boat last week and was hit by the boat’s propeller.
Two weeks ago, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission issued a public notice to alert boaters to safety tips regarding divers-down flags ahead of the start of the lobster mini-season. On July 24, the first official day of the mini-season, a diver was severely injured after being hit by a boat and was transported via air ambulance to the hospital.
If you were injured on the water in Florida, call a Leesfield & Partners attorney today for a free consultation at 800-836-6400.