A 27-foot boat that caught on fire Wednesday in the Ohio River was pulled out by first responders, and police are unsure what caused flames to spread through the vessel.
According to Economy police, Bridgewater firefighters extinguished a fire that started on the boat at 8 p.m. Wednesday. The boat was in the Ohio River near the area of Punks Ice Cream shop.
The boat was occupied at the time, police said. The people aboard had to jump into the water and swim to shore, police said. There were no injuries.
The boat was towed out of the water, police said. It did not sink.

Just because you’re surrounded by water doesn’t mean you don’t need a fire extinguisher. A Lake of the Ozarks boater had need of his on Monday afternoon, when his 29-foot Sea Ray caught fire. 
According to the Missouri State Highway Patrol, Mitchell Lampe was driving a 2007 Sea Ray around the 23 Mile Marker of the Lake when an alarm began to sound on the boat. When Lampe checked the engine, the Patrol says he found flames. Lampe used his onboard fire extinguisher to put out the flames.
Per Missouri law, Class 2 (26+ feet) and larger boats are required to carry two B-I or one B-II type fire extinguishers on board. Boats shorter than 26 feet are only required to carry a single B-I fire extinguisher.
There were no injuries as a result of Monday’s fire, and the boat—having sustained some damage—was towed to the owner’s dock. Not a great way to end a day on the Lake, but it could have been far worse.

A boat explosion on a Kentucky lake has injured eight people, although authorities say none of the injuries were life-threatening.
Kentucky Fish and Wildlife Conservation Officer Daniel Richardson tells news outlets a couple were on board the 32-foot (10-meter) cruiser at Green Turtle Bay Marina when the blast occurred Sunday. He says the explosion came after the motor was started while the boat was tied to the fuel island.
He says nothing currently indicates that the explosion was caused by anything but mechanical failure.
The husband and wife were treated at hospital with what Livingston County emergency management official David Koon said were "moderate" injuries. Koon says six others were treated at the scene.
Richardson says the boat was completely destroyed, with "debris for 100 yards."

Four people are injured after a boat fire on Lake Orion Sunday. 
Police responded to the 100 block of S. Andrews St. for a boat fire.
After fueling the boat at their dock, the owner of the watercraft attempted to start it, when it flashed over, burning the four occupants.
The occupants discharged the onboard fire extinguisher and extinguished the fire before the Lake Orion Village Fire Department arrived.
The owner and operator of the boat, a 75-year-old Orion Tonwship man, a 78-year-old Orion woman, a 56-year-old man from St. Petersburg, Florida, and a 49-year-old woman from Williamsburg, Virginia, all suffered first-degree burns to their feet and legs.
Despite being burned, all four of them refused medical attention.

A boat has exploded at Lake Barkley.
It happened just around 12:30 p.m. Sunday at the Green Turtle Bay area near the fuel pumps.
Our own Evan Gorman was on another boat in the marina and was the first to call 911.
Fish and Wildlife officials say a man an wife were on their 32 foot boat and had just refueled when the explosion happened. 
They say the couple was able to make it off of the boat, and were taken to a Paducah hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
Witnesses say the boat came up out of the water, flipped, and went back in. They say once it took on water, it caught fire and sank. 
Officials say a nearby pontoon boat was also damaged, and some of the people on it had minor injuries that were treated on scene. 
"We had just kind of gotten up for the day, sitting around talking to each other, relaxing and just all of a sudden you heard this loud explosion unlike anything I've ever heard," said Evan. "We just watched a fire works show last night, a really nice show at a different marina, but what we heard this morning doesn't even compare at all to what we heard."
Officials say a similar explosion happened Wednesday on Kentucky Lake. They say they usually have about one a year in  that area. 
Officials remind boaters to make sure they turn on their blowers for the correct amount of time after refueling. 
In this case, they say they aren't sure if they were not left on long enough or if they malfunctioned. 
Officials tell us they are surprised there were not more serious injuries. 

For one boat owner, the Memorial Day weekend was not a good start to the summer.
On Friday evening around 7:45, a powerboat caught fire in Manchester's inner harbor.
Manchester firefighters responded and extinguished the fire. The boat was totaled and sank to the bottom in several feet of water adjacent to the town boat ramp, according to police.
While the ramp was not damaged, it was closed overnight into Saturday, when the boat was pulled from the water by the Coast Guard and Manchester harbormaster, police said.
No injuries were reported. 

Lucas Firefighters responded to a boat fire Saturday afternoon at Wilson Lake.
At about 4:30 PM Saturday, firefighters were paged to the fire.
According to Justin Couse with the Lucas Fire Department and Russell County Emergency Management, the fire started in the boat's engine compartment after an explosion.
The occupants of the boat bailed out and were picked up by other boats.
There were no injuries.
The boat was destroyed.
Russell County EMS, Russell County Sheriff's Deputies, Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism Officers, and the US Army Corps of Engineers also responded.

​As thousands of people crowd Minnesota lakes and rivers for the unofficial opening of the boating season this weekend, water patrols are out in full force to remind them of a new law sparked by a young girl’s death three years ago.

The state is the first in the nation to require some boats to install carbon monoxide detectors to catch buildups of the gas before it turns deadly.

“If it can save one life, it’s worth it,” Darvin Kroeger said after he was stopped on Lake Minnetonka on Sunday.

He already had carbon monoxide warning stickers but didn’t know his cabin cruiser also needed a detector. The new law, which went into effect this month, is named Sophia’s Law after Sophia Baechler, 7, of Edina, who died on Lake Minnetonka in 2015 when carbon monoxide leaked from a hole in an exhaust pipe on her family’s boat.

While no carbon monoxide-related boat fatalities have been reported since then in Minnesota, a 24-year-old Wisconsin woman died from carbon monoxide poisoning in 2017 on the St. Croix River.

Carbon monoxide poisoning can happen when gas builds up from an idling motor, generator or faulty motor exhaust system. It’s a hidden danger because the toxic gas is odorless and invisible. Symptoms include headache, dizziness, weakness, nausea, vomiting, chest pain and confusion.

Minnesota has more than 540,000 motorboats. And all boats with an “enclosed accommodation area” — sleeping areas, galleys with sinks, toilet compartments — must have a marine-certified carbon monoxide detector and post three warning stickers about carbon monoxide poisoning. The state Department of Natural Resources estimates 8,000 boats are affected by the rule.

While some new boats already come with the detectors, owners of older boats will have to retrofit them to comply with the law, which has already won national acclaim. It also requires all motorboats with “an enclosed occupancy space” — smaller areas that a person might enter — to have the three carbon monoxide poisoning warning stickers. An estimated 45,000 boats are affected.

The new law was supposed to take effect last year but got postponed a year until May 1.

At West Marine in Minnetonka, the detectors have flown off the shelves with boaters preparing for the start of the new season. Salesman Greg Zimmer said Sunday the store sold about 1,000 detectors in the past month. Most boaters seem to know about the law and the need for the detectors, which he said cost an average of $100.

“It really hasn’t been an issue, except for the sticker shock,” he said. “I think it will be a springboard for other states.”

A half-hour before sliding his boat into Lake Minnetonka for the first time this year, Jorj Ayaz of Mound installed his new detector.

“It’s probably the best $130 I spent,” he said. “It was the right thing to do.”

After hearing about Baechler’s death in 2015, he bought a residential carbon monoxide detector for his boat. But since the new law specifies a marine-certified one, he threw it out and bought one that complied with the law.

“What a life-altering thing with something that’s supposed to be fun,” he said of the girl’s death.

On Baechler’s family’s boat, carbon monoxide leaked from a hole in the exhaust pipe after a muskrat had chewed through it, creating a hole underneath a mattress area where the second-grader was resting. The family had been on the boat for only 35 minutes. In 2013, two men fishing on Lake of the Woods died from carbon monoxide caused by a faulty exhaust system.

The DNR advises boaters not to leave motors idling or generators running while anchored or docked, not to sit on the rear swim deck while the motor is running, and to stay back at least 20 feet when water skiing or tubing. Motors and exhaust systems should be maintained each year.

Authorities from the DNR and Hennepin County’s Water Patrol said they will be focusing on educating boaters on the new law. And with ice-out delayed this year, leaving some lakes ice-covered until earlier this month, boaters should also be aware of the dangers of cold water.

As of May 22, three people have died on waterways in Minnesota, the same number of deaths this time last year, which ended with 12 people killed on lakes and rivers. Officials also warn that more boaters are driving distracted by smartphones and other devices, causing a surge in boating accidents.

On Lake Minnetonka, the Twin Cities’ largest lake, authorities were out patrolling Sunday as jet skiers and boats of all sizes zoomed by in the hot sun.

“This has been a weird year,” said Kroeger, of Burnsville. “A month ago we had snow on the ground and now it’s 90.”

Multiple agencies responded to a Carteret County boat fire that forced five people into the water Friday afternoon.
The Sea Tow Crystal Coast says a 40 ft. boat in Adams Creek in caught on fire around 2:30 Friday afternoon.
All five passengers were pulled out of the water by people in a nearby boat named the Shine Eye Girl.
Sea Tow Crystal Coast Captain Zach Willis pulled the boat into shallower water and, along with boats from Towboat U.S., used their boat motor to spray water on the fire for about 15 minutes.
That allowed the Beaufort Fire Department, and Cherry Point Fire and Rescue to get on scene and put out the flames.

For Hamilton County Sheriff Jim Hammond, water safety is a very personal matter. In 1947, his father drowned in an accident when Hammond was just 4 years old.
During a news conference on water safety Thursday at Chester Frost Park, Hammond recalled the tragedy.
He said his 25-year-old father was duck hunting from a canoe on Lake Kissimmee in Florida when his boat overturned. He had been wearing lace-up hunting boots that he couldn't get off and he wasn't wearing a life jacket — mistakes that cost him his life.
Hammond said he was too young to remember the incident, but the tragedy resulted in all the children in the family being made to learn to swim, and it made Hammond safety conscious when it comes to the water.
"I've always been sensitive about people being careful around water," Hammond said.
Waterways of every size will be covered with craft ranging from houseboats and bass boats to kayaks and stand-up paddleboards as this weekend's unofficial kickoff to summer gets underway, and local officials want to make sure everyone is safe.
In 2016, the U.S. Coast Guard ranked Tennessee 10th in the nation for boating accidents, with 116 incidents, records show.
During the 2017 Memorial Day weekend, there were 17 boating-under-the-influence arrests and one injury accident reported by the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. Alabama saw two boating fatalities during the same weekend, according to the Marine Patrol Division of the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency. The deaths involved a man and his 3-year-old son who were in a kayak in Cleburne County when it overturned. Neither was wearing a life jacket, officials said.
So far in 2018 in Tennessee, there have been five boating-related fatalities.
Several years ago, when Hammond was chief deputy, he responded to a call at Chester Frost Park. Two couples had been drinking on a boat when one of the men decided to swim to shore.
"He got in trouble and his buddy dove in to help him, and neither one of them had on a life jacket," Hammond said. Both men died.
Law enforcement officials hope to keep tragedies like that from happening again.
At the Thursday news conference, Sgt. Matthew Purvis and Deputy Sam Roistacher said officers will work during the holiday weekend checking boats for proper registration and equipment.
That means they will be looking for safety equipment, including a life jacket for every person on board, a fire extinguisher and a throwable life ring or seat cushion made to double as a life preserver, Purvis and Roistacher said.
Children 12 and younger are required to wear an appropriately sized, U.S. Coast Guard-approved life jacket whether moving, anchored or moored, and all occupants aboard are required to wear one when the boat is underway.
So what's it like to be stopped for a boating safety and registration check?
Roistacher and sheriff's office spokesman J. Matt Lea stopped Cleveland, Tennessee-boater Joshua McDonald near a Chester Frost Park boat ramp Thursday.
Roistacher turned on the Marine Patrol boat's blue lights, slowed as he approached, and got within speaking distance of McDonald to begin the check.
When Roistacher asked, McDonald produced a fire extinguisher, horn, life jacket, up-to-date registration and throwable seat cushions, passing muster with the officers.
Roistacher said officers try not to make the check a bad experience for boaters who are obeying the rules.
McDonald said he'd had his sporty cabin cruiser for about two years. He said the boat was equipped with a gas-powered electrical generator but, with safety in mind, it is also equipped with a carbon monoxide detector to alert him to any dangerous fumes.
Regina Young, representing Erlanger hospital's trauma services at the news conference, said that besides drowning, carbon monoxide poisoning is one of the most deadly accidents involving boats.
"[It] is a concern, especially if there's a closed cabin," Young said.
In the event officers catch someone piloting a boat while under the influence, what happens next?
Purvis said officers try to find someone aboard or who can be contacted without much trouble to pilot the boat back to a ramp to avoid having to call a tow boat.
"Almost always there's a person on the boat who is not drunk," Purvis said.
Another boating danger that has increased in recent years is the popularity of kayaks, stand-up paddleboards and canoes on all bodies of water, officials said. Three of Tennessee's boating-related deaths this year involved paddlecraft, TWRA officials said.
Agency officials said last year that infrequent or new paddlecraft users typically don't see themselves as captaining a vessel or think they need to understand boating safety and state laws.
Paddlecraft operators are exempt from a law that requires motorboat operators born after Jan. 1, 1989, to complete a boating safety course. But officials say knowing the law is vital for safety, because powered vessels can overtake a slow-moving paddler and dangerous high water or winds can pose a threat in an instant. They also say a life jacket is an essential part of safety equipment for paddlers.
In the end, careful planning is the best way to have a great time on the water, officials said.
Taking a few minutes to check some of the boat components may be the key to having a safe outing. Performing a simple maintenance check before getting on the water can prevent problems. Check hoses to make sure they are in good shape, make sure the lights work and carry extra fuses and bulbs, officials said.
"Enjoy your day, but while you're out there use the safety rules. Make sure that those that are with you wear those life jackets," Hammond said.