The United States affirms that two sailboats that left Mexico for Cuba with help arrived “safe and sound”

“The United States Coast Guard received a report today at 10:36 (11:36 in Argentina) that the two vessels transited safely to Cuba,” a spokesman, Anthony Randisi, told AFP in a statement.

The Coast Guard was not involved in the search efforts for the ships.

The sailboats identified as “Friendship” and “Tigger Moth” carry nine crew members, including a three-year-old child. They had left on March 21 from Isla Mujeres, near Cancún, to bring humanitarian aid to Cuba, amid the island’s economic deterioration. And they were reported missing.

The Secretary of the Navy (Semar) of Mexico had reported on Thursday that it was carrying out a search and rescue plan for locate two boats with nine crew members of various nationalities, who had set sail on Saturday from Isla Mujeres, in the Mexican Caribbean, heading to Havana with humanitarian aid, without any communication or confirmation of their arrival until that moment.

According to the information available, these vessels “planned to arrive between on March 24 and 25″, Therefore, the corresponding protocols were immediately activated, “in compliance with the responsibility of the Mexican State to safeguard human life at sea,” Semar said in a statement.

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel expressed his “special concern” on Friday about the whereabouts of two sailboats.

“From our country we do everything possible in the search and rescue of these brothers in struggle,” said Díaz-Canel in his X account.

The sailboats were the last two of the Mexican delegation of the Nuestra América convoy that set sail on March 21 from Isla Mujeres, near Cancún, to bring humanitarian aid to Cuba, amid the economic deterioration in the Caribbean country and the oil blockade imposed by the United States.

The boats occupied by several activists, including two women, six men and a three-year-old minor, were initially scheduled to depart on Friday afternoon, but had to be postponed to Saturday due to adverse weather conditions.

Semar, through the Mexican Navy acting as Coast Guard, explained that, in parallel, it maintains international coordination through communication with the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centers (MRCC) of Poland, France, Cuba and the United States, nationalities of the crew members, “in order to strengthen cooperation and the exchange of information in real time.”

The text explained how as part of the Marine Plan, the naval commands based in Isla Mujeres and Yucalpetén were alerted, as well as the Naval Search, Rescue and Maritime Surveillance Stations (Ensar).

In the statement, Semar explained that it deployed surface and air units, including ‘Persuader’ type aircraft, which execute maritime and air search patterns on the estimated route between Isla Mujeres and Havana, “considering the programmed route, possible change of course points, as well as the meteorological conditions and predominant sea currents in the region.”

In addition to maintaining “permanent monitoring” to update the search plan and “the definition of probable drift zones”, and “increase the probability of locating the vessels.”

The Mexican Navy called on the international maritime community, including commercial, fishing, recreational vessels and platforms that operate in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, so that, “if they have information or sightings of the aforementioned vessels, they immediately report it to the nearest naval authorities.”

These two sailboats join the ship that left on Friday from Progreso, in Yucatán (southeast), and that arrived safely on Tuesday in Havana, with most of the humanitarian aid collected by civil organizations.

In total, the convoy transported around 30 tons of aid, including food, medicine, hygiene products and solar panels.