A counselor and two children escaped after being dragged beneath the barge but three girls drowned
A tugboat captain has pleaded guilty to seaman’s manslaughter after a crash in Miami that killed three girls from a sailing camp.
Yusiel Lopez Insua, 47, was piloting a 25-foot (8-meter) tugboat pushing a construction barge across Biscayne Bay on July 28, 2025, when the barge slammed into a sailboat carrying a camp counselor and five girls.
The 108-foot-long (33-meter-long) barge was loaded with construction debris, bringing its total weight to about 149 gross tons. The vessel’s forward view was obstructed by a deckhouse and crane, and no crewmember had been assigned to serve as a lookout, according to prosecutors.
This prevented Lopez Insua from seeing the sailboat carrying the 19-year-old counselor and five girls ranging in age from 7 to 13. Their boat had lost wind and stalled in the tugboat’s path, investigators said.