Friday, December 23, 2022 around 3 a.m., the maritime unit of the Joint Rapid Action Forces of Puerto Rico, spotted a small boat overloaded with migrants and quickly went to the scene.

Unfortunately, the boat, in difficulty, capsized near the beaches of the Puerto Rican seaside town of Rincón, throwing all the passengers into the water who made it to shore as best they could. The Joint Forces agents saw a small child in distress and immediately jumped into the water to save him, rushed to a hospital in Mayagüez, it was unfortunately too late and his death was pronounced.

Jeffrey Quiñones, the spokesman for Customs and Border Protection in San Juan, said the boat would have transported 25 men and 8 women from Haiti. There was also a Dominican national and an Iraqi national on board. Two women were also hospitalized. "IThis is a danger that is always prevalent," Quiñones said, "The journey is very dangerous. In the area of the Mona Passage, a lot of things can happen."

Jeffrey Quiñones, the Spokesman for Customs and Border Protection in San Juan (capital of Puerto Rico) said that the small boat was carrying according to the testimony of the castaways : 25 men, 8 women and a 3-year-old child from from Haiti and also a Dominican and an Iraqi. Mentioning the hospitalization of two of the passengers, Quiñones recalled that traveling in the Mona passage area (between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico) was very dangerous https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-36657-haiti-flash-shipwreck-at-least-11-haitians-dead-36-survivors-number-of-missing-unknown.html

Photo thumbnail : Migrants' boat.

TB/ iciHaiti