At least 10 immigrants dead off Boynton Inlet; 17 rescued; search continues, after packed boat flips

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By MICHAEL LAFORGIA, BILL DIPAOLO and JASON SCHULTZ

Palm Beach Post Staff Writers

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

RIVIERA BEACH — One by one, the bodies were carried off the boat in a somber sunset procession. Wrapped in silver tarps or white sheets, they rode up the long wooden dock on gurneys.

The paramedics had a steady rhythm worked out by the time they reached the last one - a tiny brown package, small enough to carry in a gym bag. The body of a child.



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In the latest sad chapter in the ongoing immigration saga played out in the deep waters between Florida and the Caribbean, about 30 Haitian and Bahamian immigrants spilled into the Atlantic Ocean early Wednesday after their boat capsized about 15 miles off the South Florida coast, the U.S. Coast Guard said.

The men, women and children, including an expectant mother and a man stricken with appendicitis, bobbed and treaded water helplessly for about 10 hours, driven inexorably northward by the Gulf Stream. Battling hypothermia and exhaustion in the 70-degree water, they might all have drowned had not a boater on a pleasure cruise spotted two figures among the waves and called for help.

By nightfall, at least 10 of the immigrants, including the child wrapped in brown, were confirmed dead. An unknown number were missing.

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http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/local_news/epaper/2009/05/13/0513oceanrescue.html

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1. kick

this is such a tragic story.