Once again illegal boat to Puerto Rico costs lives

[Dolores]

At least five persons, including an adolescent, lost their lives as yet another one of these jerry-built open boats apparently capsized off the south coast of the Dominican Republic near Guayacanes in southeastern San Pedro de Macoris province.

According to authorities, some 43 persons were rescued, many of them by local fishermen who made several trips out and back to bring survivors to the shore.

Dominican Navy and other craft also took place in the effort. The incident took place Saturday, 27 July 2024, in the early morning. So far, the authorities have recovered five bodies, two women and five males.

Personal accounts of the tragic events were given to reporters. One of the heroic fishermen who saved many lives, Emilio Vasquez, related to reporters how difficult it was to rescue some people and be forced to leave others in the water because there was no more...

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[NanSanPedro]

I don't understand the desparation of Domicanos/as. If they have a cedula, they can work. I don't get the acceptance of risk. Haitians, OTOH, makes sense, at least from their perspective.

 

[JD Jones]

I don't understand the desparation of Domicanos/as. If they have a cedula, they can work. I don't get the acceptance of risk. Haitians, OTOH, makes sense, at least from their perspective.

Ignorance. They believe the grass is greener on the other side.

One of my mechanics is a deportee from NY that went by yola many years ago. He always says it was one of the stupidest things he's done in his life.

 

[Lucifer]

I don't understand the desparation of Domicanos/as. If they have a cedula, they can work. I don't get the acceptance of risk.

It's the lure of easy money, and the supposedly greener grass.

I've known many Dominicans--even some close relatives--who have made the trip, some are U.S. citizens now, while others are back in Dominicana, some vouching never to try again, and others planning to do it again.

And now there are hundreds, if not thousands, of Dominicans in P.R. who never regularized their status and remain undocumented.

Once, around New Orleans, I spoke to a man whom I knew while I was growing up in Higüey, and he bragged about arranging trips and then pushing folks overboard... and hammering their fingers when they tried to hang on the gunwale.

 

[FF1]

A friend of mine from Sosua spent 1000s of dollars paying a lawyer to get a visa to Nueva York, a few years ago he went and got a job at some scrap metal processing plant, lasted about 2 months and came back, said life in US is terrible, work-sleep-work... said the life he has in Sosua is much more fulfilling and would've been better if he spent the money on Presidente instead of the maldita visa.

 

[aarhus]

A friend of mine from Sosua spent 1000s of dollars paying a lawyer to get a visa to Nueva York, a few years ago he went and got a job at some scrap metal processing plant, lasted about 2 months and came back, said life in US is terrible, work-sleep-work... said the life he has in Sosua is much more fulfilling and would've been better if he spent the money on Presidente instead of the maldita visa.

Nice with a happy ending to one of these stories.

 

[CG]

30 odd years ago had a friend living in Rincon, PR. Early every morning, everyday of the week there would be a dozen or so, sometimes more, people wadding ashore and line up waiting to make a call from the payphone in the parking lot below his house, by 11 AM they were all gone, poof!, simply vanished into the countryside... Everyday!