Looking back - FV Ana on the rocks

Just over a year ago, in March 2008, Tapi Taio’s fishing boat FV Ana ended up on the reef in Panama. It was a Saturday afternoon and conditions were calm so the grounding was a bit of a mystery. Cook Islands News photographer Matariki Wilson, who took the still photos at the start of this video, says the engine must have failed and the boat just got swept onto the reef.
Poor old Tapi had a run of bad luck back then. In November 2007 he was the centre of controversy when his decrepit inter-island freighter Miss Mataroa was loaded with asbestos and sunk in deep water a few miles offshore. There were environmental concerns but nobody could come up with an alternative way of getting rid of the stuff, mainly old roofing, so down it went.
Then in January 2008 a storm washed up a second inter-island freighter, MV Maungaroa, on the reef in front of Avatiu Harbour.
That wreck was still there when the FV Ana ran aground.
It was tough on Tapi but for a few days the effort to save the boat was the best free entertainment in town.
The first attempt was to get a line on board and tow the boat off the reef. Tapi’s last remaining freighter, the Manu Nui, and the Ports Authority tug Toa stood by but it all came to nothing as this video shows.
More later…