Water taxi says no one was injured on boat

About a week ago, San Pedro Water Jets, opened a branch of its operation in Belize City.  The new water taxi business hopes to bring competition to the industry.  But an incident which occurred after four p.m. on Thursday appeared to have damaged the reputation of the organization rather than the boat in the question.  According to the general manager of the domestic branch of San Pedro Water Jets, no one was injured in the incident.

Harrison Longsworth, General Manager, San Pedro Water Jets (Domestic Branch)

harrison longsworth

“Actually what happened was that on approaching the pier on the back side of Caye Caulker, which is the normal approach to let the people off on that pier, a cable broke on the console of the boat and it didn’t stop as quickly as it should have. It was gliding in—normally the way it glides in to settle at the dock, it couldn’t be reversed in time and it hit the bulwark. It was a slight bump, it wasn’t anything of consequence and the break in the cable happens as any veteran captain or seaman will tell you, these cables will break; they may be new and they will break. So it happens minimally, but this in an incident where it happened and the captain lost control of the engine briefly and it came to a stop by hitting the bulwark.”

Jose Sanchez

“Was anyone injured?”

Harrison Longsworth

“Nobody was injured. I don’t know if they were even shaken. Not that anybody mentioned to me; the captain said everybody was fine and they proceeded on from Caye Caulker to San Pedro to have the boat repaired.”

Jose Sanchez

“I know most people haven’t heard of Water Jet Express. Tell me a little bit about this company. Where is it located?”

Harrison Longsworth

“Water Jets Express is the domestic branch of San Pedro Water Jets Express International which has a vessel that runs from San Pedro to Chetumal daily. We’ve managed to get the permits to run domestically from San Pedro to Belize City. We have four runs daily coming from San Pedro and four runs going back to San Pedro from Belize City.”

Jose Sanchez

“And where so you operate from in Belize City?”

Harrison Longsworth

“We operate from the terminal that we constructed at Birds Isle.”