Sixty-four-year-old Vernie Brown is desperately awaiting word on her 44-year-old son, Kyon Brown, who remains unaccounted for following the capsizing of the MV Barima off Guyana’s coast on Saturday night.
Brown said her son boarded the government-operated ferry in Georgetown on Saturday, intending to travel to the North West District before heading into the interior in search of employment.
But after the vessel capsized approximately seven miles offshore near the mouth of the Pomeroon River, Brown has been unable to determine whether her son survived. “If he’s alive, he must be there somewhere…just hoping for somebody to come and rescue him,” the distraught mother told Kiskadee Watch yesterday as she sought answers about the ongoing search at the Umana Yana in Kingston.
The MV Barima departed Georgetown shortly after 3 p.m. Saturday for Port Kaituma and issued a distress call shortly after 11 p.m. before capsizing.
Brown said her son had wanted to leave Georgetown for some time and saw the trip as an opportunity to find work and build a better future. “Mommy, I don’t need to stay in this town anymore. I need to go,” she recalled him telling her.
She supported his decision and helped him prepare for the journey, believing he would be safer and have better opportunities working in the interior. “I thought I was doing good by putting my child on the boat to go and seek employment,” she said in tears.
Brown accompanied her son to the wharf before the vessel departed and said she spent hours purchasing food, a hammock and other necessities for the trip. However, she said she became concerned as she watched cargo continuing to be loaded onto the vessel. “I was saying the same thing: why are they still putting more load on the boat?” she recalled.
She said that the vessel appeared heavily loaded and added that, based on her previous trips aboard the MV Barima, it had frequently travelled with large amounts of cargo and passengers. “The boat was overloaded with cargo and with passengers. It was overloaded,” she contended.
Brown said the absence of confirmation has left her clinging to hope that Kyon may still be alive somewhere awaiting rescue. Her anguish comes as authorities grapple with discrepancies in the MV Barima’s passenger manifest, making it difficult to establish exactly how many people were aboard when the vessel capsized.
Authorities initially reported that the ferry’s manifest listed 116 passengers and 17 crew members. However, officials later disclosed that a significant number of those rescued were not recorded on the manifest, raising questions about the actual number of people who were aboard.
Having travelled aboard the MV Barima on several previous occasions, Brown said vessels making the journey through rough coastal waters should be properly inspected, maintained and equipped before being allowed to sail. “That boat should have never left this port unless it is fully equipped,” she said.
As search teams continue combing the sea for those still missing, she said she intends to keep praying that Kyon will be found alive. “I’m going home, and I’m going to pray to my God,” Brown said. “If he’s alive, he must be there somewhere.”
Meanwhile, 61-year-old Lloyd Smith of 74 East Ruimveldt Housing Scheme was also waiting outside Umana Yana for word on his two brothers – Kenrick and Neal Kurt – who went missing when the tragedy occurred. They worked in the canteen of the boat, according to Smith.
“Tell me about my brothers and let me get some satisfaction,” he appealed to authorities, as he expressed frustration over being able to receive no information so far. “I heard nothing so far. Just hearing they find 67 people and from then it’s just that. We coming here since yesterday – whole day yesterday – nighttime; this morning early as possible and get no word from them. And I just sitting down in there; nobody comes,” he expressed.
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