Da­reece Po­lo

The MV Em­prende­do­ra has ar­rived at the Port of Port-of-Spain to pro­vide re­lief to lo­cal truck­ers and the peo­ple of To­ba­go af­ter the MV Cabo Star had been down since Au­gust 23 due to a fire that dam­aged one of its aux­il­iary en­gines and elec­tri­cal ca­bles.

The in­ter­im ves­sel is a land­ing craft with about a tenth of the Cabo Star’s ca­pac­i­ty. It docked at around 1 pm af­ter an 18-hour trip from Venezuela and will be fund­ed by the Bridge­mans Ser­vices Group that owns the Cabo Star.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia as he await­ed the ar­rival of the ves­sel, Chair­man of the Port Au­thor­i­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go Lyle Alexan­der said the car­go ship, which comes with its own crew, re­quires cer­tain ex­emp­tions and cer­ti­fi­ca­tion to work in this coun­try. He ex­plained that this will not hap­pen overnight.

“The ves­sel has to be cleared by Cus­toms and Im­mi­gra­tion then the Mar­itime Ser­vices Di­vi­sion. Since the re­quire­ments re­quire the in­ter­ven­tion of pub­lic of­fi­cers, I can­not guar­an­tee that that will hap­pen to­mor­row,” he said.