RedactedNarrative: Upon my arrival, I was approached by a white male, later identified as the operator of the vessel in question, Operator.  I asked Operator if he or anyone else was injured.  He replied that he was uninjured and alone on the vessel at the time of the fire.  I then asked him to describe what had happened.  He stated that he had launched the boat from the Damsite boat ramp and motored out to the mouth of the cove.  He stated that after operating the boat for less than 30 minutes, he noticed smoke coming from the engine compartment in the floor of the vessel.  He opened the compartment and the engine was on fire.  He stated that he attempted to extinguish the fire with an extinguisher.  He stated that when he did this, the smoke was too thick to see or breath.  Operator then decided to try and beach the vessel and jump overboard.  He stated that he swam back to the ramp and could not get out of the water due to the steep rocky bank until he got back to the ramp.  Operator was asked if he had ran the engine blowers to vent gas fumes and he stated yes.  He was also asked if the engine was equipped with a backfire flame arrestor.  He stated that he was unsure.  I then asked him for his driver's license and wrote down initial information from him.
        I then made contact with two officers from the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers who had a vessel on the water.  I then notified SOC of the vessel fire without injuries by phone.  The two USACE officers and I then traveled by vessel out into the lake where they had already located Operator' vessel.  Operator' vessel had drifted down the lake in a Western direction and come to rest up against the rocks and rip-rap of the dam.  There were no visible signs of smoke or fire damage when the vessel was first observed.  There was, however, extensive damage to the bow area of the hull, approximately 2 1/2 to 3 feet above the water line that was consistent with the vessel striking a fixed object or rocky shore line.  We then attached a rope to the vessel and pulled it back to the boat ramp.  We assisted Operator with getting his vessel back onto a trailer.
       After the vessel was removed from the water, I boarded it and inspected the damage to the engine compartment.  There was minimal visual damage to the engine, however, it was apparent that a fire had occurred.  On top of the engine, what appeared to be a breather cap had been hot enough to be distorted in shape as if it had melted.  It was obvious that a fire extinguisher had been used to try and put out the fire due to all of the extinguishing powder left on the engine and inside the compartment.  I also observed an empty fire extinguisher lying in the floor of the vessel near the operators seat.  I noted that the throttle was in gear and slightly in the forward position.  There were minimal signs of smoke or flame damage to the inside of the engine compartment.  None of the hoses or electrical cables appeared to have fire damage.  There was no visible fire damage to the deck or outside of the vessel.  The only external damage was a large impact area on the bow area of the hull.  This impact area was approximately 2 to 3 foot in diameter with several cracks to the fiberglass hull resonating from the center.  There was no paint transfer from another vessel and appeared upon inspection to be damage from striking a rocky shore line.