Currents News Staff
Through the heat and rough seas, more than 300 Haitian migrants tried to come ashore, but instead had to be rescued at sea.
“You really feel horrible for the people that are going through that you can only imagine the atrocities that they’re facing back home were,” said Cuyler Brown.
Coast Guard and Border Patrol were working together to bring those migrants to safety. Four migrants even had to be transferred to a hospital for dehydration. There were young children and women, but mostly adult men.
“With over 300 migrants on board a vessel, they were extremely dehydrated in very dangerous conditions,” said Patrol Agent Adam Hoffner. “They were overcrowded, they had limited water and no life vests, so we had EMS on scene.”
About 200 migrants were transferred to a Coast Guard Cutter where they will be repatriated. At least 100 people swam to shore, jumping into the choppy water without life vests, where they had to be rescued.
This is at least the third time this year that migrants have been interdicted off the coast of Ocean Reef Club. Border Patrol says Saturday’s incident was part of a larger smuggling operation.
The Diocese of Brooklyn has a large Haitian community. Census data as of last year shows that there were more than 88,000 Haitian Americans or immigrants living in Brooklyn and about 40,000 in Queens.