More than a month has elapsed since the Island Princess was found deserted and drifting off the coast of Grenada and there is still no clear indication when it will be brought to Port Georgetown.
The cargo vessel, which may be a crime scene, is flooded and is moored at the Grenada Coast Guard base, where it was taken shortly after it was towed to the spice isle.
A security source there told Stabroek News on Monday that the relevant authorities are awaiting further directives from Guyana with regard to the vessel being removed.
Two coast guard ranks had travelled to the island a month ago to assess the condition of the boat for seaworthiness but had to abandon their mission due to the watery condition aboard. The source stated that the water mixed with diesel is still there and the owner has indicated his willingness to travel to the island to effect the necessary ‘things’ to ensure the vessel is returned here. The source also said the relevant authorities on the island are awaiting word from him.
Meanwhile, the owner, Errol Prince, told Stabroek News that he wants to travel to Grenada and bring home his boat but has to get permission from government first. “I don’t want to show up there and then I have to go and get a lawyer because I can’t get my boat back… I need to have my boat because every day that it is there, I am losing money,” Prince said on Monday.
Prince even went as far as saying that he would take an engineer with him to conduct the necessary repairs on the engine as well as a crew to bring it home if possible. He said that based on its current state, the better solution would be to tow it home and if that is the case, he would need the services of the Guyana Coast Guard. He questioned why so much time was allowed to elapse and the vessel is still moored in Grenada.
In the meantime, the businessman is keeping his fingers crossed that things would work out and he would soon be reunited with the Island Princess in Guyana’s waters.
The vessel along with her four-man crew disappeared on September 26; the last known location being the mouth of the Essequibo River.
It is suspected that Mahendra Singh called Sunil, Ryan Chin, Rickford Bannister and Titus Buckery Nascimento made up that crew.
The following week, three decomposing and gutted bodies washed up in the River and based on items recovered the bodies were identified as Chin, Singh and Nascimento. The body of Bannister, who was the security guard aboard the vessel, is yet to be found.
After the discoveries, police mounted an investigation and sought the assistance of Interpol and the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
When the flooded vessel was found there was no one aboard and the ranks of the Royal Grenada Police Force found nothing aboard to suggest that something sinister had happened to the crew.
Two passports and several pieces of clothing were also discovered.
Several police sources had told this newspaper that there was a drug link between the disappearance of the vessel and the subsequent murder of three of its crew members. They said that the manner in which the men were killed was reflective of the drug trade and had questioned who would have wanted to kill them in such a way and for what purpose.
Both the owner and Rohan Paul, who was in charge of the vessel at the time it disappeared, had strenuously denied that the incident had anything to do with drugs.
