Barrackpore family mourns as swimmer drowns at Columbus Bay

Nigel Dudoon could swim, but that did not save him from drowning during a family lime at Columbus Bay on Saturday. Now his grieving relatives are urging others to be cautious when visiting the beach.

Hunters’ Search and Rescue (HSR) captain Vallence Rambharath confirmed that his crew recovered Dudoon’s body yesterday morning, hours after he disappeared beneath the waters at the popular Cedros beach.

“Be careful, because you never know when it can happen,” his sister, Reanna Dudoon-Gallai, said at the family’s Barrackpore home yesterday.

Dudoon, 32, a construction labourer, had joined about 15 relatives on the trip. His sister said it was the first time in their adult lives that he had visited Columbus Bay.

She was preparing for work around 1 pm when relatives called, saying he was missing. At first, they thought he was still swimming, but it soon became clear that the current was pulling him away.

“Initially, I thought that he walked away. They ended up calling me back and telling me that he went into the water, and he got into difficulties. One of my cousins’ husbands tried to save him, but he couldn’t. He said he (Dudoon) called out to him for help and told him that he was in difficulties, but by the time he reached him, he just went down and never surfaced until this morning when we found his body,” Dudoon-Gallai said.

She and other family members rushed to the bay and arrived hours later, where they found coast guardsmen searching the waters. By 6.30 pm, the Coast Guard called off the search and advised them to return the next day. But the family stayed. They hired a boat and continued the search until 9 pm.

Yesterday morning, as they were leaving for the beach, the HSR team contacted them with the news they had feared: Dudoon’s body had been found. Though they had already assumed he had drowned, the confirmation left the family reeling. Among those most affected is Dudoon’s ten-year-old son, who has now been told of his father’s death.

“It is very hard because we never expected something like this to happen in our wildest dreams. It is really hard on the family.”

She remembered her brother as a kind and humble person.

HSR team member Kesraj Sooknanan told Guardian Media that they found Dudoon’s body floating around 6.05 am, about 200 feet offshore. With the tide low, they waded in, retrieved it, and secured it on the sand before calling Cedros police and notifying the family.

Sooknanan explained that water around the rocks usually ranges between five and ten feet in depth. He said during the July-August holiday season, the sea often appears calm, but treacherous underwater currents can catch even strong swimmers off guard.