Latest update March 29th, 2024 12:59 AM
Jul 19, 2010 Sports
The twelve Guyanese athletes – 4 hockey players 6 boxers – scheduled to participate in the 21st Central American and Caribbean championships scheduled for Mayaguez, Puerto Rico were left stranded at the Piarco Airport, Trinidad and Tobago for one night after Liat Airlines encountered problems of inadequate aircrafts to take them onto the final leg of the journey.
The squad left Guyana Saturday morning last for Trinidad and Tobago for a brief stopover before consummating their journey in Puerto Rico. However, reports out of Trinidad and Tobago confirmed that team Guyana was forced to overnight in the Twin Island Republic because Liat had overbooked their flights leaving a host of passengers stranded.
Reports also state that the managerial team from both disciplines was lucky to have secured an early flight to facilitate their presence at the opening ceremony on Saturday last. However, the front squad also suffered some disappointment after extremely high winds in Mayaguez; Puerto Rico forced a further postponement of the opening ceremony.
One of the Guyanese personnel had expressed disgust at the delay and not being properly informed on developments.
The boxers were reported to have been frustrated with the delay and not being able to train. Late reports informed that they were put on a flight sometime yesterday afternoon.
Reports coming out of the Puerto Rico Daily Sun stated that the National Weather Service in that country issued a warning of extremely high winds forcing a delay in the opening ceremony initially scheduled to get underway at 19:00hrs.
“It took about 20 minutes to undo months of preparation as high winds forced the postponement of the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Central American and Caribbean games,” the report said.
Everything seemed ready for the torch to be lighted as scheduled, when at 12:30pm, a strong wind current associated with a tropical wave suddenly hit the northwestern coast, violently uprooting tents, poles and lighting equipment in its path. The storm lasted for about thirty minutes and in the aftermath the Central American Stadium, site of the opening ceremonies, had suffered enough damages to force a postponement which eventually got underway yesterday afternoon.
An eyewitness recounted what had transpired. “It came out of nowhere, I saw people trying to run but they couldn’t because of the intense wind.
I was standing on the boulevard and saw tents turn over like paper airplanes. A two-storied ladder fell nearby. Everything was violent.” Wind gusted up to 75 mph in constant currents.”
The Games will be hosted by the lovely city of Mayaguez, Puerto Rico. Situated on the Western Coast of the Island, Mayaguez is known as “Porta Del Sol”, Spanish for the “Sun’s Gate” and is a popular tourist destination with plenty to offer sightseers.
The boxing contingent is flyweight, Dexter Jordon, lightweight, Clevon Rock, welterweight Devon Boatswain, featherweight Ray Sandiford, junior/lightweight Bert Braithwaite and Herlando Allicock. Vice President of the GABA, Maurice Rajkumar is the team manager.
THIS IDIOT TELLING GUYANA WE HAVE NO SAY IN THE 50% PROFIT SHARING AGREEMENT WE HAVE WITH EXXON.
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