Shipwreck!

Shortly after arriving back in São Tomé in August, I made a supervisory trip to Príncipe to check on the status of ADRA activities on that sister island.  While there, we received the unfortunate news that a boat carrying passengers and supplies from São Tomé bound for Príncipe had sunk in the ocean.  I awoke that morning hearing moaning and wails wafting in my hotel window.  By the time I reached the hotel restaurant for continental breakfast, more details about the tragedy had come to light.  Several small ships typically ply the waters between São Tomé and Príncipe.  Whenever they leave Príncipe bound for São Tomé, they carry primarily passengers, as there is very little produce and manufacturing in Príncipe that would ever find a market in São Tomé.  On the other hand, ships heading from São Tomé to Príncipe are primarily loaded with goods and supplies either produced in São Tomé or imported from abroad to help restock Príncipe’s store shelves and gas stations.  Consequently, passengers from Príncipe who had an easy time finding passage to São Tomé end up having a difficult time finding a way back home.  Unscrupulous or sympathizing ship captains relent when canvassed by desperate Principeans, overloading their vessels beyond their weight limits and praying to their saints for protection.  If it works, the ship captains make more money per trip than they would by staying within their limits.  If it doesn’t work, well…

So in this particular case, a boat rated to carry 40 tons and 21 passengers was carrying over 50 tons and 38 passengers (if I’ve got the numbers correctly – reports varied depending on who you asked), and left São Tomé at about 4:00 p.m. for an overnight journey to Príncipe.  If all had gone well, it should have taken about 12 hours to get to Príncipe.  Instead, the ship had sunk by 8:00 p.m.  The sun had gone down about 5:30 p.m., as it always does here on the equator.  Apparently, the boat had taken a medium wave to the flank, and everybody on board had panicked at the slight pitching that this had caused.  En masse, they all rushed to the opposite side of the boat and pressed against the railing.  This seriously unbalanced the vessel, and it rolled over, dumping everybody and cargo into the sea.  The boat itself sunk quickly, and thankfully, many people were able to grab onto cargo and hold on until being rescued – a task made all the more difficult by the darkness of night.  Unfortunately, however, 14 people died, and several more required hospitalization.  The captain himself probably wishes he had died, too, as he must now live the rest of his life with the weight of a poor decision on his shoulders.

Throughout the following day in Príncipe, the mood was subdued and mournful.  The greeting of everybody in the streets that day was, “Did you have any family members on the boat?”  Only 6,000 of STP’s 150,000 or so residents live on Príncipe, so it’s an even more tight-knit community than São Tomé.  EVERYBODY is either related or a close friend to everybody else.  So every family was affected in one way or another by the tragedy.  One particularly hard hit family lost a mother, three children, and two nephews in the accident.  In the immediate aftermath, the government majorly ramped up port security, stationing armed soldiers at regular intervals all along the waterfront and heavily fining violators of load regulations.  But this is the 5^th boat to go down in the past 10-15 years, and local residents tell me this always happens after a tragedy.  What is really needed is for such regulation BEFORE accidents occur – in other words, all the time, since one can never know when “before” will occur until it’s too late.  Now there is only one boat remaining that plies the route between São Tomé and Príncipe, so unless a new ship is added to the route, a golden business opportunity exists for anyone willing to open up a reliable service between the islands.  Thankfully, air service still exists, though it is out of the price range of most residents.  For the sake of those residents, better boat service is desperately needed.