Drishti told to remove floating rescue stations

Panaji: After sitting on Drishti’s application for the floating Seahorse rescue stations, the ports department finally refused to grant permission and asked Drishti to dismantle the temporary rescue platforms. Drishti has already dismantled one Seahorse platform along the Calangute-Baga belt.

“I asked the captain of ports to serve a notice to them and to remove it. We cannot give permission for it,” said ports minister Digambar Kamat.


According to the captain of ports records, Drishti Lifesaving Pvt Ltd submitted an application on Sep 25 asking for permission to deploy temporary floating stations at various beaches.

Ahead of the festive season, Drishti deployed four floating ‘Seahorse’ platforms at Calangute, Candolim, and Miramar in North Goa, and Baina in South Goa. According to Drishti, the temporary floating stations allow lifesavers to monitor swimmers and beachgoers from vantage points at sea and react quicker to emergencies.

Drishti Lifesaving is the agency appointed by the tourism department to protect swimmers, and the agency outlined plans to deploy six floating stations at Arambol, Calangute, Miramar, Colva, Cavelosim, and Palolem beaches. These temporary floating stations were set up in 3-5 ft of water depth and were used for rapid rescue intervention.

The floating stations came in handy when 13 students aboard a fishing trawler had to be rescued at Miramar. Their fishing trawler was used for a marine study tour when it ran aground on a sandbar around 200m off Miramar beach.

Department records show that despite permission sought in Sep to deploy the floating platforms, the ports department responded only in Dec, when fishermen complained about the platforms being erected at the beaches.
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