Chaguanas man drowns at Manzanilla

Relatives told police that Hermant Mootilal, a machine operator, of Bachu Kariah Road, Peters Field, went for a last dip in the sea at about 4:20 pm when he got into difficulty.

Mootilal’s wife, Valini, told Newsday that she watched in horror as her husband got into difficulty and disappeared beneath the surface of the water. Valini, 25, said she and her husband would have celebrated their second anniversary in July. She said, “Everything happened so quickly.”

Hermant said he was going to take his last dip. He went into the water and the next thing I heard people saying somebody drowning. When I looked in the direction where my husband was bathing I only saw his hands, his body was already under the water,” she cried. Valini said a friend who accompanied them on the lime held on to Mootilal’s hand and called out for help. Using a piece of bamboo, she said, other sea-bathers fished out her husband’s body from the water.

Grief-stricken mom, Dolena, 48, said she was liming at a beach at Carenage when she received a telephone call informing her of the tragic news. Dolena said: “My son told me on Saturday night that he was not liming this weekend because he had to go to work. I do not know what made him change his mind.”

Valini also told Newsday that on-duty lifeguards and Emergency Health Services paramedics attempted in vain to resuscitate her husband.

An EHS ambulance took the body to the Sangre Grande mortuary. An autopsy is due to be performed today.