MV Sonia sails today

Port Authority of Trinidad and Tobago (PATT) Chairman Noel Garcia, who was in Tobago yesterday, told Newsday that contrary to reports, the Sonia had not “broken down” and will in fact be sailing from Port-of-Spain to Scarborough around 9 am today. Meanwhile, a PATT source told Newsday the US$24,000 a day bill to use the wetleased vessel  will not be paid by Government for the two days the vessel was down for repairs. This according to a top official at PATT.

The PATT source said that conditions of the wetleasing mandated that the owners of the vessel were responsible for maintaining it and as such, because it was down for two days, Government was not obligated to and will not pay the daily sum of US$24,000. Garcia told Newsday unclean diesel fuel caused the Sonia’s fuel pump to malfunction and while the Sonia could have sailed on Saturday, PATT decided that “caution was better than valour” in this instance. He said the fuel pump has since been repaired but out of an abundance of caution, the Authority requested an additional pump be flown in from Miami.

This pump was expected to arrive last night. Garcia had previously indicated that PATT would not allow the Sonia to sail if it felt there was any risk to the lives of its crew and passengers. He explained that when the situation with the Sonia arose on Saturday, The Cat was prepared to make a second trip for stranded passengers. However Garcia said because it was only 150 passengers and very little cargo, the Authority did not believe the use of The Cat was warranted and subsequently the MV Panorama was used to transport the passengers and cargo.

Garcia said since its arrival, MV Sonia has been working “non-stop for 18 days” and yesterday the boat would have been “checked over.” He added that even new vessels experienced problems from time to time. While Garcia said the Sonia would be sailing from 9 am today, PATT has reportedly introduced new sailing times for The Cat to facilitate passengers in Trinidad who wish to vote in today’s Tobago House of Assembly elections.