More than 100 Haitian migrants land in Key West after spending 7 days at sea

A group of more than 100 migrants from Haiti arrived off Key West in a sailboat early Wednesday morning, according to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office.

The boat arrived about 100 yards off the 1800 Atlantic condominiums near Higgs Beach around 3:40 a.m., according to the sheriff’s office. About 117 people — 87 males and 30 females, including some children — were on the vessel, according to a dispatch provided to the Miami Herald by the agency.

One child and one adult were taken to Lower Keys Medical Center to be treated for injuries that were not life-threatening, according to the dispatch.

The people told authorities that they were at sea for seven days, according to the sheriff’s office.

All of the people were turned over to the U.S. Border Patrol. Adam Hoffner, assistant chief patrol agent for the Border Patrol’s Miami sector, told the Herald the people will be taken to the agency’s facilities in Marathon, in the Middle Keys, and Dania Beach, in Broward County.

While migrant landings by people fleeing Cuba are a frequent occurrence in the Keys, boats arriving to the island chain from Haiti are much less common.

Arrivals from Cuba are usually smaller groups on makeshift boats. Typically, people coming from Haiti are on overloaded vessels like the one that came Wednesday.

The last arrival from Haiti to the Keys was in February 2023, when 114 people came ashore in the small Upper Keys community of Tavernier.

Wednesday’s arrival comes amid an ongoing executive order by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis issued in January 2023 that sent an influx of state law enforcement officers and National Guard soldiers to help patrol the seas and skies for incoming migrants.

The order was in response to a surge in migrant arrivals from Cuba and Haiti that taxed Monroe County Sheriff’s Office deputies and Keys-assigned Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officers who were usually the first to respond to the landings, which were happening sometimes several times per day between late 2022 and early 2023.

Since then, landings have dwindled, but, as Wednesday demonstrates, boats do still get through.

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