They throw safety to winds

KOCHI: The safety kits distributed to fishermen to avert accidents on sea   and to alert rescue services seem to have gone down the drain. Proper use of this safety kit, which has a variety of equipment including a  radar reflector, could have averted mishaps like the one that occurred on Friday where two fishermen were shot dead in the sea after being suspected as pirates.“The radar reflector on the fishermen’s boats can reflect the radar signals  sent by bigger ships. This helps ships to detect the boat from a distance  and observe it using their equipment. A fishing vessel can thus be easily identified,” said Deputy Director of Fisheries K G George Kutty. He added that on Friday, the merchant vessel could spot the boat only when  it was too close and there was no way to observe them. “Thus, in the  commotion that ensued, they mistook the fishermen to be pirates,” George Kutty said.  Though the kits were distributed last year, the fishermen refused to use  them. Each kit, worth about `15,000, contains a GPS (global positioning  system)-supported radio beacon, heliograph, radar reflector, medicines,  light units and life jackets. “During inspection we found that the fishermen do not even take the kit with them to the boats. They keep it at their homes. Some kits were not even opened,” he said.However, the fishermen said that most of them were unaware as to how to use the equipment. Classes were held on how to use it but very few attended them. Last year, in a few stray cases, the fishermen had accidentally pressed the button of the radio beacon. When pressed or when it hits water, the beacon   would send signals to the Coast Guard, alerting them to launch rescue operations. But the false signals sent by the fishermen had irked the Coast Guard which had launched rescue operations in full swing only to find the whole thing was a mistake. “A few fishermen had pressed the device to understand how it works. But,  after we were warned against using it unnecessarily, most of them do not use  it now,” said A C Clarence, Ernakulam district president, Matsya Thozhilali Congress.Moreover, the safety kits hardly reached the hands of those who really  needed it. The kits were distributed free of cost to traditional fishermen. Since most of them ply only on the waters close to the shore, these  equipment were often unnecessary as these areas come under the range of  mobile phones.  Larger boats were given only a subsidy of 25 percent to buy the kit. “The  larger boats could avail of the kit from us and a subsidy of 25 percent was  provided. But hardly any boat owners approached us. Moreover, we can give  the facility to only those boats which are registered in Kerala,” said the  Deputy Director of Fisheries. Around 300 boats in the state are migrant boats which move from one area to the other.