Hope fading fast for 3 missing at sea

Family members of three people missing at sea are still clinging to the now slim possibility that their loved ones are safe. Johnston International employees Ian Jackson and Charles Moody, accompanied by Moody’s seven year old son, were last seen leaving the Radisson pier around five p.m. on Friday where they had fuelled The Demonstrator, a fifty foot aluminium vessel, for the seven hour journey to the Turneffe Atoll. The men contacted Belize City around nine-thirty that night, indicating they were approximately two miles outside the reef. They were never heard from again. For four days now, search parties both in the air and on the water, have scoured the route the men were expected to take from Belize City to Turneffe, and the surrounding reefs. Tonight those rescue teams returned home…without their friends. Authorities suspect the vessel may have capsized during the bad weather on Friday night as various items that were onboard, including a thousand gallon diesel tank, have since been found. News 5 understands that The Demonstrator was equipped with bright red lifejackets. The crew was due to complete maintenance work on the company’s dredge, moored in the waters off the Turneffe Island Lodge on the southern tip of the Turneffe Atoll.