Coast guard cutter puts humanitarian mission training to the test

The Barbados Coast Guard is putting its training for humanitarian missions to a test of resilience as it contends with numerous explosive eruptions at St Vincent’s La Soufriere Volcano.

Coast guard patrol vessel HMBS Leonard C Banfield on Friday sailed to Kingstown taking aid supplies to Barbados’ neighbour, 159 kilometres (99 miles) to the west.

A crew of 20 sailors and officers encountered extremely low visibility due to ashfall, which only grew denser as the 42-metre (138 ft) 240-ton vessel came closer to the island.

For Lieutenant Shawn Hazelwood, HMBS Banfield’s commanding officer, the contingent was adequately prepared for the challenges they confronted on route to Kingstown Harbour.

He explained sailors prepared for these humanitarian missions through military simulations that focus on navigating conditions that are likely to be encountered in Barbados.

He said: “Travelling into a low visibility situation in St. Vincent and the Grenadines is something that we would have been prepared for due to prior training. Additionally, part of our security mandate as part of the RSS [Regional Security System] is to do south setter patrols and north setter patrols. So this isn’t the first time we would have gone to St. Vincent, so we are relatively familiar with the area and we know how to get in and how to get out.”

With hundreds evacuated from the volcano’s red and orange danger zones, troops were asked to send special equipment, make-shift beds, water sanitization kits and potable water for those displaced by the eruption.

While it is still unclear whether they may be asked to evacuate some Vincentians to Barbados, Lieutenant Hazelwood stressed that the troops are ready to carry out any instructions given.

The commander said: “Once we get a task, we just have to find a way to make it happen. You could appreciate that a patrol vessel isn’t a cruise ship, but we would do our best to render assistance. Obviously, if we were in the same position, we would want someone to do their utmost for us, so that is what we are going to be doing for our brothers and sisters in St. Vincent.

“Persons would have been evacuated from their homes, they may not have been able to have left with a lot of stuff so at this point in time, and they will need items to support them within the shelters. So we are looking at stuff along the lines of toiletries and those sorts of things.”

Utilities are still intact on the southern end of St Vincent making it easier to make contact with personnel on the ground, the coast guard commander said.

There is still no definitive word on how many such trips will be made. Petty Officer Romario Broomes, the coxswain on HMBS Banfield who steers the coast guard patrol vessel, revealed that the nature of the missions will require a different approach to the maintenance of the vessel at the dock, but also in the ocean.

Petty Officer Broomes recalled having to double the number of lookouts on the vessel as they approached St Vincent as the visibility worsened.

The sailors were forced to wear personal protective equipment to prevent them from inhaling the ash.

He said: “We would have ensured that we shut the flaps that allow fresh air to come in, thereby shutting off the ash from entering the vessel. Once we did that, we sanitized the vessel by wiping down all the bulkheads, walls, petitions inside the vessel and ensured that persons leaving and entering the vessel were sanitized on entry.

The ship’s chief engineer, Petty Officer Devon Edwards added that while the vessel responded relatively well to the environs, a maintenance plan would need to be worked out to help deal with the “adverse impact” of the ash on the engines.

Commissioned in 2007, the HMBS Leonard Banfield was the first of its class of the coast guard’s three patrol vessels, alongside flagship HMBS Trident and HMBS Rudyard Lewis. The Dutch-built Damen Stan 4207 patrol vessels have seen high-profile missions to Dominica, ferrying supplies in the wake of hurricanes in 2015 and 2017.

So far this year, the Barbados Defence Force maritime unit has been kept busy in counter-narcotics operations with the Royal Barbados Police Force and the Regional Security.

An interdiction last week netted about $4.9 million dollars’ worth of cocaine and cannabis and nabbed four people.

(kareemsmith@barbadostoday.bb)