At least three people have reportedly died, several others have been injured, and one remains missing after two boats collided off Saint Lucia’s West Coast around midnight.
The head-on collision occurred in the waters off Soufrière and Canaries, involving one boat travelling south and another heading north.
Several people sustained injuries, including broken arms, broken legs and other serious injuries.
St. Lucia Times spoke with one of the rescuers, who described a frantic effort to bring survivors to safety after the collision.
He said many of those on board were found clinging to the wreckage before rescuers brought them to a nearby beach, where they received treatment.
Up to the time of publication, police had not released any official information on the incident.
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Condolences to their families, loved ones and others. This ought to be a horrendous time for all concerned. One thing is certain, the victims didn’t have to go out like that. An evening of joy turned otherwise.
In the coming days, post mortems will be conducted ad nauseam on talk radio shows. By the end of the week, sweet nothing would have changed. We are an extremely unsafe people. Safe citizens are viewed as freaks of nature.
We need to include safety in our school curriculum to create awareness. Forget about the older generations because they are a lost cause. A few years ago, a gentleman who was/is affiliated with the fire department wrote a book on safety. I say, someone needs to review it. Let’s get going to educate our young people. Let’s stop the heartbreaks, higher medical costs, needless added expenses and time wasting. Time to implement safety instructions as part of “de culture.”
One would have to believe that there are two people responsible for this tragic outcome. How do two vessels travelling in opposite directions collide head on, on the wide open seas? It’s likely that neither boat operator had their night time running lights on.
If that turns out to be a factor in this case. It’s bad luck that two stupid people would encounter themselves that night.
This is horrible, condolences to all families involved may they take comfort in the mighty God I am heartbroken
Well how do two boats collide on that big sea? The alcohol consumption per capita outranks that of any other country. Careless , no regard for safety, professionalism. And how the heck they come out after midnight? Apparently St Lucia is too lax with these boat rides all over the place. Condolences to the victims
It used to be that head- on collisions were a land based vehicle preserve on the island’s roads, unfortunately it has now spread to the seas, let’s hope that all aspects of this tragic incident are examined with a view for nothing like this to ever happen again.
My Empathy goes out to the victims, just as there are roads on land so to does the sea for those who don’t understand why this happened with a large body of water or ocean, speed and lighting plus not paying attention if a factor, please be careful everyone
I am in total agreement with @strombone. This is negligence to the highest extreme and/or ignorance of utilising nighttime boat lighting which is essential so that such an event does NOT occur. There are a lot of young men out there driving boats with no clue of safety and operating protocol of such vessels. Time for boat owners to get OVER the radar and secure themselves and their employees! This disaster should not have happened – especially when there are operations and equipment to prevent such.
Sincere condolences to the families, I am at a loss …
Spot on @PouleFoo.
My husband cannot believe that 2 boats travelling in opposite directions – on sea, at night – had no lights to indicate their presence! Unbelievable!
Safety protocols for night time boating operations was total ignored. Sad to here of such an incident…….Total negligence and lives lost……unbelievable.
How could one be surprised. The level of selfishness, ignorance one encounters on a daily basis and blatant disrespect for our laws is definitely a societal problem. Interestingly, safety concerns always rears its head for a few days anytime something so dramatic and sad happens.
We live in a semi lawless environment and we have society to blame…it all starts with us.
Feel sad and sorry for all those affected by this senseless tragedy. Hope we as a society see this as a teachable moment and use this as a platform to try to be better and do things within the law.
@Lincoln you are spot on with your comment and I agree —- according to the following proverb —
“Truer words have never been spoken” means that a statement is completely accurate or undeniably true.