La Digue Feast No major maritime incident recorded |20 August 2022
The authorities overseeing this year’s maritime safety for the Feast of the Assumption have said they are generally satisfied with how it went.
The Seychelles Police, Seychelles Maritime Safety Authority (SMSA), Seychelles Coastguard (SCG) and Seychelles Ports Authority (SPA) had put in place extra precautionary measures from August 12 to August 15 to ensure safety.
The authorities had stepped up patrols during the festive season and deployed additional workers to La Digue Island to ensure boat skippers and passengers were adhering to security measures.
These included command points on land and at sea by the police, additional patrols by the Seychelles Marine Police and the Seychelles Coast Guard, a fast response boat deployed the SMSA, as well as restrictions on the operation and use of all vessels under seven metres in length, water scooters (jet skis) and speed boats.
Masters and skippers were also asked to notify the SPA prior to each departure.
Seychelles NATION spoke to SMSA, SPA and the SCG, which said the four-day celebrations on La Digue went without major incident.
The chief executive of the SMSA, Captain Joachim Valmont, said although he was satisfied, there was always room for improvement.
“We received the public’s cooperation. Both the skippers and passengers followed the measures in places including the number of passengers allowed on the vessel. They sought permission before any trip and notified us as well when departing so in general we are satisfied with their actions,” said Captain Valmont.
He also commended the other authorities, namely the SCG and marine police which worked alongside the SMSA.
“They worked diligently. One minor area where I hope we could see an improvement in the future is with regard to manpower for the marine police. As you know they have few skippers, and I hope that if they want to grow, they should be able to hire two or three additional skippers to be placed on standby for patrols for such events,” added Captain Valmont.
Although SMSA did not report any incident on La Digue, it was called to assist a boat which capsized near Mahé, in the vicinity of Pointe Larue, which claimed the life of a Sri Lankan skipper.
The authority also attended to another boat on Mahé, a hire craft, transporting passengers on an excursion, which started taking in water.
According to Captain Valmont, the coast guard responded promptly and managed to assist the skipper and passengers, with the help of another boat in the vicinity.
For its part, the SCG also said everything went generally well.
The Commander of the SCG, Colonel Jean Attala, has however cautioned masters and skippers to remain vigilant as the weather condition has not improved.
“As we have noticed this year, the seas are really rough and it will remain so for a while longer, so I would caution everybody going out at sea to remain vigilant,” he said.
The SPA, which mobilised additional staff on both Praslin and La Digue to handle all port-related operations, especially at the La Digue jetty’s area, said that as planned no vessels were allowed to stay in berth position at the La Digue jetty during the festive days.
In a communique it said since there is an ongoing project to extend the La Digue jetty, all vessels had to vacate berth and moved to a safe anchorage position away from the jetty area once their passengers had disembarked and the public respected this.
The authority said it was satisfied that no major incident was recorded this year.
It should be noted that a boating accident in 2016 claimed the lives of three adults while two minors, a nine-year-old girl and a five-year-old boy, lost their lives after the boat they were in capsized in 2018.
Patsy Canaya