Arrival of Cuban migrants forces temporary closure of Dry Tortugas National Park






U.S. Border Patrol



David Goodhue, Jacqueline Charles

Sun, January 1, 2023 at 4:58 PM EST






U.S. authorities are investigating an unusual flurry of Cuban landings in the Florida Keys that by New Year’s Day had nearly topped 500 as the National Park Service announced the temporarily closure of Dry Tortugas National Park to the public to provide care for some of the arrivals.

Adam Hoffner, U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s division chief for Miami operations, told the Miami Herald that they are “still investigating” the multiple landings involving Cubans, which the National Park Service on New Year’s Day said included approximately 300 Cubans who had arrived in the Dry Tortugas National Park over the past couple of Days.

“Homeland Security Task Force — Southeast is aware of multiple migrant landings this weekend on @DryTortugasNPS,” Homeland Security Task Force said in a tweet, adding that U.S. Coast Guard Southeast and partner federal, state & Homeland Security Task Force components “are coordinating efforts to recover those currently stranded on the remote, uninhabited islands.”

On New Year’s Day, U.S. Border Patrol agents also confirmed that separately, they had apprehended more than 160 Cuban nationals who had started arriving early Sunday morning.

By the afternoon, agents had counted at least 10 different migrant landings that had stretched from Key Largo to the Florida Keys.

The unusually high arrival of Cubans in just a few short days is not only keeping U.S. law enforcement agencies busy, but is raising questions about what might be behind the sudden flurry up and down the Keys, which is dealing with the largest increase in maritime migration from Cuba and Haiti in nearly a decade as both Haiti and Cuba undergo a worsening crisis and economic turmoil.

In the case of Cubans, migrants have been coming on smaller, homemade vessels.

Haitian nationals, meanwhile, travel in lager, overcrowded vessels. Though their arrivals in the Florida Keys have been less frequent than Cubans, thanks to stepped up U.S. Coast Guard efforts off the northwest Coast of Haiti, their high numbers still haven’t been seen since the early 2000s.

With the arrival of the latest group of Cubans on Sunday on the islands near Fort Jefferson, the Dry Tortugas National Park will be closed as of 8 a.m. Monday, the National Park Service announced. The closure is expected to last several days.

Park officials say cutting off public access to the park is necessary for the safety of visitors and staff because of the resources and space needed to provide care for the migrants and coordinate transport to Key West. Concession-operated ferry and seaplane services are also temporarily suspended.

“Like elsewhere in the Florida Keys, the park has recently seen an increase in people arriving by boat from Cuba and landing on the islands of Dry Tortugas National Park,” the National Park Service said in a statement. “Park first responders provide food, water and basic medical attention until the Department of Homeland Security arrives and takes the lead.”

The Dry Tortugas are located about 70 miles from Key West and are a popular tourist destination.


https://www.yahoo.com/news/arrival-c...215801050.html