Two infants were among 17 passengers who went missing along the Fly river in the middle Fly district, Western Province.
The kids are one a month old and the other three weeks old. Both were with their parents with other passengers who boarded a 40-horsepower engine dinghy at Kiunga wharf last Saturday at 11 am and were traveling to Lake Murray.
While on their way at around 6 pm they encountered engine failure.
The 20-foot banana boat operator tried all means to repair the failed engine but were not able to.
The boat with passengers drifted over the mighty fly river from Saturday night until Monday afternoon at around 3pm when they got rescued.
Kasa Primary school head teacher Mr. Lupson Numaya who is also one of the survivors said they drifted for 38 hours until National Maritime Safety Authority (NMSA) reached and rescued them.
Mr. Numaya and other four teachers were onboarded together with 11 passengers and were returning to Lake Murray when they encountered the unfortunate incident.
“We were halfway to reach Lake Murray when the NMSA team reached out and rescued us. It will take another two days again to reach our destination.”
“I’ve served in Lake Murray for more than five years and I’ve encountered these similar incidents on countless occasions.”
“Other incidents I experienced were with adults and were bit OK but this recent one was the worse one as we were traveling with infants.”
“The kids battled the rain, cold, and mosquitoes in the open area until we got rescued. This will be my life story to tell my families and friends,” Numaya said.
Numaya from Lake Kopiago in Enga province has spent half his life serving in Western Province and is concerned about the way of using transport in the area.
He is further urging the Western Province governor and Middle Fly MP to seriously consider setting better means of transportation for the people in the area to avoid such situations.