A larger vessel plowed into a 7-foot dinghy carrying Davide Veglia and his 14-year-old son in Biscayne Bay on Wednesday evening, killing the Florida CEO and leaving his boy hospitalized with a broken arm. The operator of the larger boat never stopped.
Police have not identified the operator. No arrests have been made. The vessel that struck them vanished into the night, and the man at its helm is still out there.
Veglia, the founder and president of South Florida-based ABTS Convention Services, was pronounced dead at a local hospital, the Post reported. His son survived, pulled from the water while clinging to his unconscious father.
The collision occurred around 8:11 p.m. in a channel off Miami Beach. Veglia and his son were aboard a small dinghy when an estimated 30-foot vessel struck them. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has released surveillance photos of the suspected boat, which was last seen traveling north from Biscayne Bay between 7:45 p.m. and 8:15 p.m.
At a press conference Thursday, FWC Officer George Reynaud offered the public what little description authorities have:
"The vessel involved has not yet been identified and is described as possibly a 20- to 30-foot boat with possibly two outboard motors and is described as possibly a dark blue boat with black bottom paint."
That's a lot of "possibly" for a boat that killed a man. The description is vague enough to cover hundreds of vessels in South Florida waters. Without more precise identification, finding this boat will require either sharp-eyed tipsters or the conscience of whoever was behind the wheel.
Samuel Londoño and Enzo Avelino, two teenagers in the area, became the first responders to a scene no kid should have to witness. Londoño described the moment they realized something was wrong:
"We hear 'Help, help!' That's when I run to the dock, and I see like a silhouette or like a shadow of something, and we make it out and [say], 'That's someone, they need help, they need help.'"
Avelino said they immediately called police and tried to keep the boy calm in the water. He yelled for the boy to float. The 14-year-old, with a broken arm, floated in Biscayne Bay holding onto his father. Avelino recalled the grim reality of what they saw when help arrived: "The dad was unconscious when they got him and brought him back."
Two teenagers did what the operator of that boat refused to do. They stopped. They acted. They stayed.
Davide Veglia founded ABTS Convention Services, a medical communications firm, in 1995, when he was just 25 years old. He built the company into an operation with offices in Miami, San Francisco, Rome, and Belgrade. That's not a man coasting on connections. That's a man who built something real across four cities and two continents.
His best friend, Joao Moraes, said the two had spoken earlier on Wednesday and planned to have lunch on Friday. Instead, Moraes spent Thursday grieving. "I'm in shock. I sat down all day and cried because I lost the best person in my life."
Moraes also said simply: "I lost my best friend."
Hit-and-run cases on the road provoke outrage. Hit-and-run on the water should provoke something closer to fury. The open water offers fewer witnesses, fewer cameras, and far more room to disappear. That makes the obligation to stop even more fundamental. When you strike another vessel and people are in the water, you are likely the only chance they have.
Whoever operated that boat made a calculation Wednesday night. They weighed the life of a man and his child against whatever consequences they feared, and they chose themselves. A 14-year-old boy floated in the dark, holding his dying father, because someone decided their own escape mattered more.
The FWC has surveillance photos. The public has a vague description. Somewhere in South Florida, a dark blue boat with black bottom paint is sitting in a slip or under a cover, and someone knows exactly where it is.
A father took his son out on the water for an evening ride south of Miami. One of them came home broken. The other didn't come home at all.