A 24-foot pleasure craft was found in flames just off Franklin Beach in Gibsons on Tuesday morning.
Police say the boat belongs to Gambier resident John Fraser and was reported stolen the night before.
A local Gibsons resident saw the smoke from the fibreglass boat early Tuesday morning and called the fire department.
"The boat was burned down to the waterline by the time we got there," said Gibsons Fire Chief Bob Stevens.
Gibsons Fire Department got the call at 4:52 a.m. and were on scene in seven minutes, but Stevens was there almost immediately as he lives near the beach.
"One of my neighbours happened to be up and walking around at that time in the morning, saw the boat and called it in," he said, noting the floating fire could have been very dangerous if it had ended up in a marina.
Fire crews parked at the top of the hill on Franklin Road and ran lines down to the beach where they used foam to douse the flames.
"The trouble with fibreglass is it burns really hot and it feeds on itself," said Stevens.
Once the blaze was knocked down, crews beached the boat on the sand where it now sits.
"We're sort of caught in a federal loop with this thing. We've been going through different agencies to see who is responsible for disposing of the boat, but we've just been getting the run-around," said Stevens.
Police say the owner has just moved to Gambier Island and doesn't have a phone, so Coast Reporter was unable to reach him for comment.
Gibsons Mayor Barry Janyk said Fraser's insurance company should be responsible for disposing of the boat but notes if no one else does anything, it will ultimately fall upon the Town of Gibsons.
"Our bylaw compliance officer is aware of the boat, and we're looking into it," he said.
Local residents have tied the boat up to shore so it doesn't float away in the meantime.
Stevens says the fire department gets, on average, one call a year for boats on fire, mainly in the marina."Those are usually electrical fires, though," he noted.
This boat fire appears to be the work of vandals. Sunshine Coast RCMP is still investigating the incident.
