Po­lice be­lieve that a body that washed ashore in Man­zanil­la on Mon­day, may be one of the five bod­ies seen in a pirogue on Sun­day.

The pirogue lat­er sank while be­ing towed back to shore by the Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard.

Po­lice re­port­ed that around 10:15 pm on Mon­day, a watch­man at a con­struc­tion site along the Man­zanil­la-Ma­yaro Road found a de­com­posed body float­ing near the coast­line.

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard re­port­ed that on Sat­ur­day at 2:22 pm, a fish­ing ves­sel car­ry­ing five bod­ies was spot­ted drift­ing near the bp Cas­sia Plat­form.

The day af­ter (Jan­u­ary 26, 2025), while at­tempt­ing to tow the ves­sel to shore, the tow­line sep­a­rat­ed and the ves­sel dis­ap­peared from view and was pre­sumed to have sunk.

In an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia on the is­sue, Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds said it was un­for­tu­nate that the ves­sel’s de­te­ri­o­rat­ed state made it im­pos­si­ble for the Coast Guard to tow it for the en­tire jour­ney. How­ev­er, he com­mend­ed the Coast Guard’s ef­forts.

The Coast Guard has asked the pub­lic to share any in­for­ma­tion or re­port sight­ings of the ves­sel or de­bris by con­tact­ing their head­quar­ters at 868-224-3324.