Photo: Wilmer Coyi, deceased
by Kristen Ku
LADYVILLE, Belize District, Wed. Oct. 25, 2023
A tragic accident has left one construction worker dead and another injured at the Belize Defence Force (BDF) Air Wing in Ladyville. The incident occurred early on Wednesday morning, October 25, when a wire attached to the crane snapped, causing a basket in which two workers were standing to plummet while they were repairing the roof of an aircraft hangar.
Reports state that the two men were in a basket attached to the crane when the cable unexpectedly came undone. While one man, Wilmer Coyi, tragically lost his life on the spot after his neck was broken, the other, Kevin Ku, sustained minor injuries to his body.
The men had been working at the Williamson Hangar Complex, a central location that serves both the Belize Defence Force Air Wing and the Special Boat Unit, when the accident occurred.
This complex has recently been under renovation, with the focus being on the aircraft hangar which was damaged by Hurricane Lisa, and that process of repair was taking place with a sense of urgency due to the need to house the new Cessna Caravan presented to the BDF in February of this year. After completing repairs on the hangar’s two sides, the two men were in the process of working on the hangar’s front side.
Major Francis Usher, the BDF’s acting commanding air wing and special boat unit officer, provided an eyewitness account of what took place:
“At about 9:45, we heard a bang. I was underneath the hangar. We heard a bang outside. When we came out to check, we saw that one individual was lying motionless in the basket that was attached to the crane. And another was kind of jumping around as if though he had been injured,” he recounted. Usher confirmed that the basket had dropped from an estimated height of 35 feet.
Usher explained that the cable which snapped was “connected to a pulley which is what holds up the basket and it looks like that metal pulley is what hit [Coyi] in the face, in the head …”
Major Usher emphasized that the two workers were not members of the BDF but were subcontractors tasked with the hangar’s renovation.
Ensuring adherence to safety protocol and use of safety equipment such as a helmet and harness were the responsibility of the subcontractors, and not of the BDF, he noted. Major Usher made an effort to highlight the rigorous protocols that are in place at the BDF Air Wing and Special Boat Unit when projects are carried out internally by BDF soldiers.
“We take safety very seriously … we have SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) for safety to ensure that none of our personnel are hurt. We don’t determine the safety procedures that they [contractors] follow,” he said.
“We ensure that they abide by our safety protocol as it relates to aviation, as it relates to the maritime environment. However, the protocol that a building contractor follows comes from their company,” he further explained.
He mentioned that the contractors had inspected the site, provided their own resources, and made renovation proposals, with the BDF only specifying the required repairs.
The BDF and the Ministry of National Defence and Border Security have since expressed their condolences to the family of the deceased.