At least two peo­ple were killed af­ter a Guyanese Coast Guard ves­sel col­lid­ed with a civil­ian boat in the Moru­ca Riv­er, Re­gion One (Bari­ma Wai­ni) on Fri­day.

The Guyana De­fence Force (GDF) in a state­ment said the Coast Guard Raiders Craft 17 (RC 17) was in­volved in the ac­ci­dent with the civil­ian ves­sel at ap­prox­i­mate­ly 06:45 hrs (lo­cal time).

“The Coast Guard ves­sel was at the time en route to San­ta Rosa but col­lid­ed with a civil­ian boat with four (4) oc­cu­pants, whilst ne­go­ti­at­ing a turn,” the GPF said, adding that the Coast Guard Ves­sel was dam­aged and is cur­rent­ly at the base in the Pomeroon Riv­er.

It said that the civil­ian ves­sel had three adults and one ba­by on board, while the RC 17 car­ried per­son­nel from the Coast Guard.

The op­er­a­tor of the un­named civil­ian ves­sel and the moth­er of a ba­by died as a re­sult of the ac­ci­dent. They were pro­nounced dead at the Char­i­ty Hos­pi­tal. Their names were not dis­closed.

The GDF said that the Chief of De­fence Staff, Brigadier Omar Khan, Of­fi­cers and Ranks of the Guyana De­fence Force “ex­tend sin­cere con­do­lences to the fam­i­lies and loved ones af­fect­ed by this trag­ic in­ci­dent. Our thoughts are with them dur­ing this dif­fi­cult time”.

The Guyana Po­lice Force (GPF) said it had launched an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the ac­ci­dent.