Blame governments, not cops
Anonymous writes: The truth of the matter is that Cayman does not have a real ocean search and rescue helicopter that can handle a combination of high winds, rain, darkness, rough seas and elongated time in the air. It is both the UK and Cayman Islands Governments, not the RCIPS, that needs to be blamed. If they can’t afford to have the proper rescue helicopter and trained team for these types of situations, then they should have some contract in place with the US Coast Guard to send help ASAP as the US is our closest point of help, just like how there is contracts for air ambulances to fly in and pick up people here and take them to Miami.
The RCIPS is just an arm of the government; they can’t do more than what they are given and trained for. Blame both the UK and the Cayman Islands Governments for not caring enough about its people to have a proper search and rescue equipment and trained staff for these types of situations.
If you hire me to work for you, I can do no more than what you have given me to work with and trained me to do. It is the employers’ fault. In this aspect, the governments are the employers.
And remember still to thank Mr Kernohan (the former RCIPS Commissioner of Police) that we even have some kind of helicopter rather than none at all. But he was stepping on corrupt toes in high authority places in this island so he got kicked out. But history doesn’t change, and the truth of history is, it is because of Mr Kernohan we even have this helicopter.
There is too much corruption in government and that’s why they don’t solve obvious problems to help the people have a more high quality life. The government is too busy being voodood and charmed by wealthy snake charmers. They can’t even see the simplicity of the things they need to do to give the people a good quality of life.
This comment as posted in response to Marine cops injured, rough seas suspend search
Category: Viewpoint
I don’t think anyone is “blaming” the cops for this tragedy. Of course it’s not their fault. It’s that they we’re the best chance the people had at being rescued at midnight but instead waited until the morning to search. The question is why wait when their are lives at stake knowing full well the capablities the boat squad can endure from experience. You cant blame the police for someone elses mistakes. You can’t leave people out to sea in distress and wait for the risk to die down.
“You can’t leave people out to sea in distress and wait for the risk to die down.”
On the contrary, it would be idiotic to conduct a search in condition of high risk to the would-be rescuers. It’s a balancing act, weighing the threat to rescuers vs. the peril of those lost. Stop trying to reduce this to a black-and-white issue when it’s obviously a judgement call.
In a number of articles on this tragedy I don’t recall the Compass mentioning anywhere that none of the passengers on the boat had lifejackets.This policy of being “polite” especially where locals are involved is self destructive. The message of common sense boat safety needs to be hammered home loud and clear.Wearing lifejackets the occupants could conceivably have survived, without, they never stood a chance.
Bouyancy can come from a lot of different sources, it doesn’t necessarily have to come from a coast guard approved pfd. Too many bad assumptions from arm chair experts delayed rescue and recovery – not least of which the RCIPS decision not to immediately replace their IFR pilot when they apparently vacated the post in Feb.
Its a civil service decision not a RCIPS decision.
The CI government persons at the time of the purchase of the helicopter will never tell you this, but go speak to the helicopter pilot of the charter company, he was there in the US when 3 or 4 MLA’s were at a US Coastguard Base and we’re offered on the the US’s rescue helicopters. Of course we are proud people and turned them down saying we can buy our own.
We need a propper search and rescue unit may it be with police and voluntary persons, which I’m sure you would get at least 50 locals will to assist, look at the 2 boats that assist this last week.
Go to the US and ask if they would like some sort of presence on the island. There is no harm in asking, just look what Jamaica armed forces and police dept was given.
Oh I forgot, we won’t ask them, because we can buy it and we’ll make sure it the wrong item but it will be ours!!
We Caymanians are a bunch of donkeys
What do you mean by “US Coastguard offered one of their search and rescue helicopters but our MLA’s turned it down? From what i could understand back then is that there were no other helicopters available for sale at that time, that there were no choices at that time? Either buy this one or wait for another to come up available in the next year or two years. I don’t know if this had anything to do with a certain budget restriction that Cayman Government had for spending on a helicopter back then that this one was the only AFFORDABLE one back then or the ONLY ONE no matter price? It would be nice to have great clarity on all that happened back then and how we acquired this helicopter and why this and not some other helicopter?
Also you have to consider the trained staff to run a search and rescue helicopter including divers who get lowered down into the seas/shipwreck to get the people strapped on to themself or a basket or whatever. I’m not sure Cayman Government can afford to run their own high-tech search and rescue helicopter, but i do believe they could strike up some contract with the US Coastguard to assist quickly in these type of rough situations.
I’m not arguing for the sake of arguing (even though i’m upset but that is many of us who are upset not just me) but i would really want to see sensible solutions in place to give we the people of the Cayman Islands a higher quality way of life from our Government(s). We have 2 Governments over us, the Cayman Islands Government and the UK Government as a British Dependent Territory. I see no reason why we can’t have a proper search and rescue helicopter/helicopter team. The US Coastguard spends alot of time in our areas of this Western Caribbean territory looking for drug smugglers from South America, i don’t think it would be impossible to have some kind of contract/system in place for a quick response from the US Coastguard to help us in these situations since it seems we cannot afford the right helicopter/trained staff for ocean search and rescue in bad weather conditions?
My sympathies and prayers of peace to all the family members of these 5 loved ones, extra sympathies and prayers for the Mom, Dad, Grandmothers, Brothers and Sisters of the 2 precious little boys. May God hold you close and comfort each and every one of your hearts in this devastating, anguished and painful tragedy.
This is Cayman. You can make it up as you go along and pick and choose what you want to abide by. Laws here are for other.
Realist, your comment about the USCG offer is correct.
CIG was asked if they would allow a USCG HH-65 Dolphin to be based on Grand Cayman for drug interdiction work with a secondary SAR role. The
whole operation would be funded by the US Government in the same way that similar operations are run at other locations in the region.
The problem was that this was during the time when certain MLAs were doing their best to wind up the Drug Task Force and discredit the man running it so the USCG offer was very quickly rejected.
Even after the RCIPS helicopter had been purchased certain MLAs made a pretty determined effort to try and kill that off as well.
It doesn’t take much to figure out why does it?
Donkeys have more brains than some of them in office. Them don’t have any foresight. They only living for today and not planning for tomorrow.
No. ‘Everyone’ argued long and hard in the press that we needed a police helicopter, not a search and rescue one. ‘No one’ involved in getting the helicopter has clean hands.(Remember at first it couldn’t even legally fly to the Brac, much less do S&R over water.) But compliments to ‘everyone’ who worked hard after the fact to make it work for search and rescue. But lets not try and revisionalistically give credit to people who don’t deserve it. Like Kernohan. Especially since its still not really the right tool for many tasks.
Fundamentally, there should at no time be a situation where the RCIPS are missing a qualified IFR helo pilot. We expect an IFR operational capability at night and across sea to sister islands 24/7, it’s not a 9 to 5 unionized VFR position. That was the justification for the helicopter purchase. RCIPS should be replacing an IFR pilot post-haste, and should have arranged a temporary contract pilot to cover during this staffing transition – the decision not to do that, may have sealed the horrific outcome for the five. We have all witnessed the consequences of chronic faulty assumptions, poor training, and weak clerical-grade effort within the decision-making echelons of the service. We should all expect a smarter and better coordinated body than what we have.
8760 hours per year. 168 hours per week. Add in vacation allotment and assorted sick days or training and 24/7/365 coverage would require 5 pilots. Are we prepared to pay that in salaries or will be bemoan the cost come budget time?
It is very easy to say what we want. But we do not get what we want if we are not willing to pay for it.
rubbish- the government got slammed for buying this helicopter and was told over and over that it was a waste of money. Now that everyone sees the benefits of the helicopter that want another one now??? The guardian went out and was damaged by the rough seas during daylight – can you imagine what would have happened if the guardian went out in darkness.
My condolences to the families of those lost at sea, however lets be realistic when pointing fingers. We could have had a whole fleet of helicopters and marine vessels, but the fact is if you go to sea without safety equipment and no one knows you are in trouble until hours after the event you cannot be rescued. How any one can put a child on a boat without a life jacket is beyond comprehension. To go out to 12 mile bank in heavy seas without life jackets, ship to shore radio etc and in a boat made for rivers and not open waters is beyond comprehension. The skipper of the boat was responsible for this tragedy.
Yes I’m Caymanian and have owned boats. Yes I’ve gone fishing with children but never, ever in such a reckless fashion.
The Guardian most likely bottomed in either the channel or North Sound , due to the very rough seas on the day .When the draft exceeds the depth created due to a passing wave trough , you are surely aground. At least the marine unit was tasked with getting out for the search that day , they weren’t sitting about saying it was too rough . Solution ? : Dredge the main channel & an access one all the way to deep enough water not impacted by the swell , to allow their deep draft vessels safe transit in rough sea conditions. But equally important, safer conditions for their crew
Is it coincidence that then Commissioner Kernahan might have held a helicopter pilots license for the said same copter which neither has, nor, can carry a casevac winch, cannot land on water in an emergency, and has only four hours of flying capability. How suitable is that for our S & R needs? Maybe that was Kernahan’s retirement job plan? Anyway, CIG money was mostly wasted on an inappropriate helicopter!
They have what they need. The guardian.
The guardian needs a proper captain.
Everybody in Cayman is a “Captain”! LOL.
Even the bakery has one!
Thank God someone is speaking some sense here about this whole thing, finally…
Exactly. Spot on.
Correct, but 8 eyes are better than none.