By Luis Hernández Ojesto M. and Rogelio Mora Tagle
The mother of the only survivor found so far of the shipwreck off the coast of Florida that left 38 missing and at least one confirmed dead, asked the United States immigration authorities to allow her to stay in the country, after "lived through hell"
In an exclusive interview with Noticias Telemundo this Wednesday, Marcia said that along with her 22-year-old son, her 18-year-old daughter was also traveling, who is still missing.
"She told me, 'mom, my sister died, my sister drowned. I don't know mom, I looked for her as much as I could and I couldn't find her. I called her and called her and my sister couldn't take it,' says Marcia who told her your son.
Two brothers who were shipwrecked off the coast of Florida.
The 22-year-old man was the only survivor of the boat;
the 18-year-old woman is still missing. Courtesy
The 25-foot boat capsized in the sea when it ran into a storm Saturday night, shortly after it set sail from Bimini Island in the Bahamas with 40 people on board.
The young man – whose identity and nationality have not been revealed at the request of his family – was found sitting on the hull of the boat capsized by a commercial vessel on Tuesday.
"He held on to what was left of the boat, just as you can see in the photo: he held on, he held on to that and to prayer," Marcia said.
"She told me, 'I lived through hell, mom. There were women, children, many drowned on Saturday night,'" she added.
A migrant who was rescued after he was shipwrecked trying to reach the United States from the Bahamas;
on January 25, 2022.
The Coast Guard has deployed several rescue teams searching for possible survivors by air and sea on a 135-mile stretch from Bimini to Florida.
The young survivor was found 45 miles from Fort Pierce in South Florida.
However, Captain Jo-Ann F. Burdian warned this Wednesday at a press conference that
the situation has become "desperate"
and that with each passing moment, it becomes "more unlikely to find survivors.
According to what the man who survived told the authorities, none of the crew members wore a life jacket, nor provisions for the trip such as water and food.
time is running out
This Wednesday morning, the Coast Guard recovered the body of one of the 39 migrants who were missing.
The man's body was found near the Florida coast, where he is believed to have been swept away by the current.
Four boats and five aircraft are searching for the shipwrecked migrants in an area the size of the state of New Jersey, Burdian said.
"We're using all the information at our disposal to make sure our search efforts are thorough, but we can't search forever," the Coast Guard captain said.
They find the body of one of the victims of a shipwreck off Florida
Jan. 26, 202201:36
The authorities suspect that it was
a failed human trafficking operation to the United States
.
The Investigations agency of the Department of Homeland Security indicated that it has opened a criminal investigation into the case, which includes US agents in the Bahamas.
"You're dealing with criminal organizations that have no qualms about human life or safety. They really are victimizing migrants. They only care about money," Homeland Security agent Anthony Salisbury told The Associated Press.
Immigration authorities clarified that
the survivor is in their custody
.
But neither did they identify him or say what his nationality was or that of the other victims who disappeared in the shipwreck.
"Understand a mother who is devastated"
However, Marcia begs for her son to be released.
"Understand this situation, understand a mother who is devastated, discarded for having lost her daughter and is with her son at this time still in immigration care," said the 22-year-old's mother in an interview with Noticias Telemundo.
"[I ask] that they give my son freedom, that with everything he lived through - he says he lived through hell - that they please leave him free so that I can support him and he can support me. I also need my son with me to give me the strength to continue with this loss, this pain," he added.
Despite her great pain, Marcia was grateful that her son had clung to the hull of the boat: "Thank God he is alive to tell the story and honor the memory of his sister."
A deadly route
US authorities have warned for years of the extreme dangers of trying to migrate to the country irregularly by sea, particularly through the treacherous waters of the Caribbean.
[Report four dead after the shipwreck of a boat that transported migrants in Colombia]
In fact, the islands of the Bahamas have long been used as a staging point for migrant smuggling operations into the United States.
They usually try to take advantage of periods of good weather to cross, but the weather often changes suddenly and
often the boats sail overloaded and are prone to capsizing
.
There have been thousands of deaths over the years.
In May of last year, a dozen migrants from Cuba were presumed dead after they disappeared when they were shipwrecked off the coast of Florida.
The bodies of two other migrants who were traveling on that boat were recovered and eight more were found alive.
Two months later, another boat capsized off Key West, Florida.
Although 13 Cubans were rescued on that occasion, nine disappeared in the water.
In the last fiscal year (which runs from September 30, 2020 to October 1, 2021), the Coast Guard detained 838 Cubans, 1,527 Haitians, and 742 citizens of the Dominican Republic in the region that includes Florida and the Caribbean.
The agency also detained immigrants from other nations, but did not provide a breakdown of the other nationalities.
With information from
The Associated Press.