Jon Pearson was walking his dog on the North Idaho Centennial Trail about a mile from Higgens Point on Saturday morning when he heard someone shouting for help.

He looked out on Lake Coeur d'Alene through the trees and saw a man waving his arms on a boat on fire, smoke rising up, a few hundred yards from shore. 

Pearson watched as several men on a fishing boat sped in quickly from the west and pulled up. The man hopped on board and his rescuers zipped away. 

Less than a minute later, the boat was engulfed in flames and black smoke billowed into the air.

"It was really quick," Pearson said.

Coeur d'Alene firefighters and others soon arrived to douse the flames and the charred hull drifted to the shoreline.

Greyson Hoffman, alone on the boat, told The Press he had just left Higgens Point and was going to meet his father at the Silver Beach Marina, where the boat is moored for the summer, when he looked back and saw a little smoke. When he looked again, there was more smoke.

He stopped the craft and grabbed a fire extinguisher, but the flames quickly spread.

Hoffman retreated to the front of the boat and yelled and waved at a fishing boat not far away. The anglers responded.

"They were there quickly," he said.

The men tossed a rope to Hoffman, who grabbed it and pulled the boat close enough so he could jump on board. He said he was shaken, but not hurt. He said the boat had not previously had any operational issues.

A containment boom was later set up as a small sheen from the gasoline and oil formed on the lake's surface.

A Coeur d'Alene firefighter said the Environmental Protection Agency and Idaho Department of Environmental Quality would be notified.

After dropping Hoffman off, the fishermen headed back out for more fishing, a firefighter said. Their names were not available.

    Smoke rises from a burning boat near Higgens Point on Saturday morning.