A witness, Grace Kedzior-MacDonough, told Insider that the yacht caught fire around midday.
"We saw black smoke so everyone started to crowd around," she said.
By the time police and firefighters arrived to confront the blaze, the boat had burned through its moorings and was floating in the harbor, Kedzior-MacDonough said.
By then, she said, "the fire had got very out of hand."
Plumes of black smoke rise from a flaming yacht in Torquay on England's southern coast.Grace Kedzior-MacDonough
A press officer for Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue said the force was first called at 11.57 a.m.
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She could not say when the first responders arrived, but an online statement detailing a response of several crews was issued at 1.05 p.m.
Kedzior-MacDonough said that several small explosions could be heard from the yacht as the fire continued. Fire officials said the yacht contained some 8,000 liters of diesel when it caught fire.
Local police cordoned off the area, closed nearby roads, and asked people to close their windows to avoid inhaling the smoke, per an online incident report.
Smoke rises from a flaming yacht in Torquay, England on May 28, 2022.Grace Kedzior-MacDonough
Later images showed that the ship had stopped burning so intensely.
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