No sightings yet in search for missing pirogue ‘Kampai’

Search ef­forts con­tin­ue for a fish­ing pirogue that left To­ba­go ear­li­er this month for St Vin­cent and the Grenadines, but the Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard says there have been no con­firmed sight­ings of the ves­sel or its crew.

In an up­date on Thurs­day, the Coast Guard said co­or­di­nat­ed re­gion­al search­es re­main un­der­way for the 29-foot pirogue ‘Kam­pai’, which de­part­ed Buc­coo, To­ba­go, around 1:30 pm on March 2, 2026, bound for Union Is­land.

The ves­sel nev­er reached its des­ti­na­tion.

The Coast Guard said re­gion­al co­or­di­na­tion con­tin­ues with the coast guards of Grena­da and St Vin­cent and the Grenadines. Port and har­bour checks have been con­duct­ed while the Trinidad and To­ba­go Air Guard con­tin­ues aer­i­al search­es.

“How­ev­er, there were no sight­ings of the ves­sel or crew thus far,” the up­date said.

An Ur­gent Ma­rine In­for­ma­tion Broad­cast is­sued by North Post Ra­dio re­mains ac­tive, ad­vis­ing mariners across the re­gion to re­main alert and re­port any sight­ings.

Two men aboard

The ves­sel was be­ing de­liv­ered to Union Is­land by Alvin Mor­gan and Damien Re­ece, both of San­ta Flo­ra.

Cap­tain Val­lence Ramb­harat of the Hunters’ Search and Res­cue Team said the white and teal pirogue left To­ba­go with an ex­pect­ed ar­rival time in Union Is­land be­tween 5 pm and 6 pm on March 2.

Nei­ther the ves­sel nor the two men ar­rived.

De­liv­ery trip

The ves­sel had been built by a boat man­u­fac­tur­ing com­pa­ny in Trinidad for a British na­tion­al who planned to use it for fish­ing op­er­a­tions in St Vin­cent.

Sources said the boat was col­lect­ed on March 1, 2026, and one of its en­gines ex­pe­ri­enced me­chan­i­cal is­sues dur­ing test­ing but was lat­er re­paired.

Ac­cord­ing to a per­son fa­mil­iar with the arrange­ment, Mor­gan and Re­ece were ex­pect­ed to pi­lot the ves­sel to Union Is­land where it would be hand­ed over and reg­is­tered in St Vin­cent.

An­oth­er boat was ex­pect­ed to ac­com­pa­ny them for the re­turn jour­ney.

How­ev­er, per­sons wait­ing in Union Is­land said the ves­sel nev­er ar­rived and at­tempts to con­tact the crew went unan­swered.

Re­gion­al search ef­forts re­main on­go­ing.