Boodram: I never said my colleagues were dead!

Christopher Boodram vehemently denied that he told Paria Fuel Trading Company’s Terminal Operations manager Collin Piper that it was unlikely his colleagues were alive inside the offshore pipeline.

Giving evidence at the Commission of Enquiry into the LMCS/Paria Diving Tragedy at the International Waterfront Centre, Port-of-Spain, yesterday, Boodram seemed confused by the sworn statement Piper provided to the commission.

CoE chairman Jerome Lynch, KC, asked Boodram if he recalled being on a phone call with Piper, HSEQ lead Randolph Archibald and general manager Mushtaq Mohammed at 10 pm on February 25, the day the accident happened.

Boodram said he had no recollection but did not doubt it happened.

Boodram says that in the fog caused by his pain, trauma, and medication, he may have forgotten some of what he said to Paria officials about the trapped men.

But in answer to Paria’s attorney yesterday, a defiant Boodram said he was certain that he would never have told anyone that the divers were dead.

He said he told everyone from the beginning that his friends were alive.

Boodram maintained that rescue teams could have saved his four colleagues from the 30-inch diameter Sealine 36.