AMIDST swirling rumours that the three missing seamen who have proverbially vanished into thin air with the ship MV “Oliver L” are dead, family members are still hoping to see their loved ones alive and well. Speaking with this publication following a meeting at the Maritime Administrative Department (MARAD) of the Public Works Ministry in Kingston yesterday, Jewel Lewis, reputed wife of the missing Clad Burnette, said she is positive that her husband would return.
A tearful Lewis said this is not the first time that Burnette has been involved in such an incident; there was another incident when the ship had encountered difficulties and the crew were stuck for three weeks on a sand bank. She had then been surprised when her husband had returned home unharmed, and she declared herself positive that he would return this time also.
She disclosed that she had begged Burnette to make that his last trip at sea after that experience, but the man, a sailor for some seven years, had not acceded to her request.
Like Kamaldai Shuckoo and Sherry Hartman, Lewis last spoke with her husband on December 21st at around 22:18hrs. He had called to inform her of his impending return, which has not yet materialised.
“I spoke to him on the 21st of December at 22:18 hrs, and he said that he was now leaving Trinidad. And after I didn’t see him on the Saturday, I tried his phone the same night, and the phone just kept ringing out all the time,” Lewis stated.
She added that in an effort to contact Burnette, she visited the boss, Johnny, who only told her that he had also been trying to make contact in all the ways possible, but had been unsuccessful.
She told this newspaper that the boss man, like the authorities, had promised to inform her immediately if there were any new development with regard to the issue.
“I was over there on Sunday, and he said that he tried, too, and no response. What he said, too, is that he told them to call every twelve hours and they didn’t call. He said that once he (gets) any information, he will get on to us.”
Lewis said that since Burnette’s disappearance she has been praying for his safe return, along with that of the captain and the other crew member; and she expressed optimism of having them home once more.
During a media briefing yesterday with the wives and close relatives of Clad Brunette, Wexton Andrews and Ramdat Roopnarine, Transport and Hydraulics Minister Robeson Benn said that while there was still no word of the whereabouts of the seamen, an aggressive search continues to be conducted.
Benn, who informed that there was no new development in the situation, noted that every effort will be made to get to the bottom of the matter.
After discovering Clad Burnette’s cell phone had been turned off yesterday, family members discovered that the phone is once again ringing. There is, however, nobody answering the call.
Minister Benn has assured relatives of the missing men that the Guyanese authorities will be collaborating with officials from Trinidad and Tobago to trace the cellular phone belonging to Brunette.
The family is expected to be meeting with the Transport Minister sometime today.
The three Guyanese sailors, who had left Guyana on December 11th 2011, were expected to return home on their cargo vessel on Christmas Eve Day, after spending a few days in Trinidad and Tobago. They have, to date, not showed up as promised.
Local and regional maritime officials have since mounted a search for them, and the maritime authorities for Barbados, Tobago, Grenada and islands up to Puerto Rico have been alerted of the situation, and requested to keep a look out for the vessel and crew, since it may have drifted along the eastern coast of Trinidad.
There is still a team of three seamen combing the Orinoco River area in search of the vessel, but they are yet to return with a report of their findings.
The vessel is reportedly registered in the name of Raymond Lord.