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‘We just want his body back’ – family pleads for help after Corentyne fisherman vanishes at sea
(Kaieteur News) – Family members and friends of 54-year-old fisherman Permaul Punsammy of Whim Village, Corentyne, are pleading for assistance as efforts continue to recover his body after he reportedly fell overboard and disappeared during a fishing trip over the weekend.
Speaking to Kaieteur News on Monday, his daughter Kamini, 30, said that Punsammy left on November 27 last to go on his fishing activities, which he has been doing for over three decades.
Feared dead: Permaul Punsammy, 54
Kamini stated that the man alongside three other fishermen had planned to make a “double trip,” and they arrived in neighbouring Suriname on December 7 with the intention of returning to local shores in time for Christmas. The quartet, which included a captain, was fishing in the Coppename River, Suriname.
On December 15, the four-man crew left Suriname to make their second trip. “On the fifth day at sea, they were pulling in seine and they said how he tripped and fell overboard,” Kamini stated.
The grieving daughter shared that she received a call from the captain on December 20 to inform her of the incident. “The captain of the boat called me and said ‘Kamini, yuh daddy fall overboard and we can’t find he,” she said. The boat owner also dispatched another boat with some of the man’s relatives to aid in the recovery effort, which was also unsuccessful. His son-in-law also confirmed to this publication that Punsammy had some time back confided in him his inability to swim.
Punsammy’s brother was also onboard with him when the tragedy occurred. His crewmen were unable to recover him despite scanning the area immediately. The men shared a close relationship with him, his daughter noted. “We are asking for help (from) whoever can come out with speedboat or whatever, if the Coast Guard can come out and help search up this side, because…if he dead, the body gon wash to come up this side. We need more boats to come out and search.”
He was holding on to the seine, she explained, but only his sticker suit and his headlight were found. She further expressed that any survival could only be a miracle, but the family has since accepted the strong likelihood that Punsammy had drowned. As such, they are hoping that the Coast Guards or other fishermen can recover his body so that some measure of closure could be afforded them.
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