Two Canadian aquaculture workers were rescued Friday afternoon by the Maine Marine Patrol in Passamaquoddy Bay off Eastport after their boat caught fire.
During a routine patrol, Marine Patrol Officer Brian Brodie spotted Brett Newman and Patrick Blair, both of Campobello, New Brunswick, and employees of Cooke Aquaculture, paddling a life raft, the marine patrol said in a statement Saturday.
The two men had escaped a fire on their 40-foot lobster-style boat while supplying feed for Cooke’s sites in the bay.
The two said they noticed smoke and flames in the engine room and launched the life raft. They were found by Brodie about five minutes later about one-eighth of a mile from shore near Todd Head in Eastport.
Neither man was injured and both were wearing life jackets. They were transferred to a Cooke Aquaculture vessel.
The burning boat drifted in the flood tide past Dog Island and into the whirlpools between Deer Island Point and Dog Island, where it is being monitored by the U.S. Coast Guard.
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