Fishing boat runs aground amid bad weather

KOTA BARU: The relentless rainfall over the past two days has caused a fishing boat to run aground on a riverbank at Kuala Besar.

“I only realised that my boat was drifting towards the banks at about noon when I was alerted by someone keeping watch over the boat,” fisherman Hazahar Mat Sanisah, 46, said yesterday.

“The waters were choppy and rising, causing my boat to drift 10m from where it was anchored.”

Hazahar said he had to stay with his boat to keep it from being stranded on land when the tide receded.

He later dragged it back to the middle of the river with an anchor line.

Hazahar said he did not move his boat to Teluk Buaya in Pantai Mek Mas like other boat owners because his vessel was often used as an emergency meeting place for Sukarelawan Perikanan, the community for a self-regulating initiative by the Fisheries Department during floods.

His boat would also be used to transport flood victims and send provisions to nearby islands.

Scores of fishing boats have been moored in Teluk Buaya as fishermen wait for the weather to clear before going out to sea again.