The last stop of a Brazilian couple’s trip through South America was supposed to be a rest on the beach, but a walk to see the blue tones of the sea from above resulted in moments of panic, after the parachute they were in was released from the boat, throwing them both into the water.
Businessman José Lucas Moulaes Figueiredo, 29, and doctor Amanda Cavalcante Lozer, 25, from EspÃrito Santo who live in Campinas, arrived last Thursday (28) on the island of San Andrés, Colombia. On the beach, in a local tourism company, the couple hired the parasailing tour, a kind of parachute hoisted by a motorized boat that sails close to the coast.
Cameba Tours acted as an agent for Toninos Parasail, responsible for the tour, which cost 195 thousand Colombian pesos (R$ 264). Figueiredo and Lozer waited for the boat to arrive in a tent on the sand, where they received instructions. The boatman instructed the couple to, in an emergency, trigger a mechanism that would close the parachute canvas, preventing it from gliding.
“I even played with the boatman, for him to make us very high, very high indeed. He laughed and said: ‘Leave it to me'”, says Figueiredo. The flyover was going well until a heavy rain appeared on the horizon, increasing the strength of the wind. This caused the parachute to end up having a kind of tug of war with the boat.
With the boat’s engine being beaten by the wind, the businessman began to get scared. “I looked down and saw that the boat was about to capsize. The instructor said: ‘Everyone to the right, if you don’t tip over’, and kept on that back-and-forth”, he says. The crew still tried to lower the anchor, but were unsuccessful. At that moment, according to Figueiredo, they released the parachute rope.
When he saw that he was no longer tied to the boat, with the possibility of the wind blowing them through the air towards the city, he activated the emergency device. The parachute then closed, throwing the couple into the sea, a few meters before the waves broke.
The team didn’t go to rescue them; a man aboard a watercraft, which was not part of the agency, rescued the two and took them back to the vessel – not without first rumbling over the fact that the boat was allegedly not far enough from the beach for that activity.
Figueiredo says that later he noticed a frayed piece of rope and reported this impression to the instructor, believing that it had broken. Laughing, the crew said that in fact they had untied the rope, without warning the Brazilians. “After that, they asked: ‘Would you like some water?’. I do. That’s all.”
Afterwards, the boatmen repaired the anchor, reorganized the equipment, waited for the weather to settle down and returned to activities with other clients — including Figueiredo’s sister, who decided to take the tour despite knowing what had happened. According to the businessman’s account, she said that the boatmen said that everything was fine with the couple and that the fall was normal.
Safely, Figueiredo and Lozer returned to Brazil last weekend. wanted by Sheet, Cameba Tours claimed that the outsourced company is responsible for the tour, which carries out the activities with parachutes. The report sent messages to the boatman, but had no response.
