June would see Newfoundland and Labrador enter the international media spotlight as tragedy played out off the coast of Newfoundland.
On June 19, OceanGate’s Titan submersible lost contact with the Polar Prince after leaving St. John’s for the wreck of the Titanic.
A widescale international search effort was launched with Canadian, American and British search and rescue and coast guard personnel taking to the water in an attempt to track down the untethered vessel before life support systems ran out. As OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush explained to VOCM News first in February, the subsea vessel was equipped with four days of oxygen.
US Coast Guard spokesperson Captain James Frederick
Five people were confirmed to be onboard—Rush himself, UK billionaire Hamish Harding, French pilot Paul-Henri Nargeolet and Pakistani businessman, Shahzada Dawood and his 19-year-old son Sulemon.
As the race-against the clock continued, international media, including CNN’s Anderson Cooper converged on St. John’s for 24-hour coverage.
On June 21, underwater noises were detected, offering the first sign of hope of finding the Titan but those hopes were soon dashed when, a day later, a debris field was found, consistent with a “catastrophic loss of the pressure chamber“, instantly killing all five men on board. A series of investigations were launched by various agencies, including the US Coast Guard, Transportation Safety Board and RCMP.
(Debris recovered from the Titan Submersible wreckage. June 28, 2023)
A week later, debris from the Titan, lifted from the ocean floor, was brought to St. John’s, including presumed human remains.
On Alert
On June 8, the province would be gripped by an Amber Alert, indicating a 14-year-old girl had been abducted, allegedly bound for New Brunswick. Police were able to track the teen down to a cabin on the Bay D’Espoir Highway, where she was found with a man and woman who were taken into custody. A third man was arrested in Badger.
Seventy-two-year-old Wilbur Jerome Crockwell of New Brunswick was charged with abducting a person under 16 and luring a child online, while 63-year-old Erin Bast and 69-year-old Frederick Cyril Boone, both from Milltown in this province, were charged with child abduction and conspiracy.
All three were released on bail. The matters remains before the courts.
Red Rift
June brought with it an apparent first for the current provincial government—a rift with its federal counterparts in Ottawa.
The conflict was driven by the planned implementation of the federal carbon tax, a policy Premier Andrew Furey claimed did not make sense for Newfoundland and Labrador, given the skyrocketing cost-of-living.
Furey, along with the three other Atlantic premiers, came out against the tax—set to be implemented July 1 and requested an immediate meeting on the policy. Newfoundland and Labrador, which had been charging its own carbon tax, rolled back the policy.
PC Leader David Brazil called Furey’s comments “too little too late“.
Despite the calls from the Atlantic Premiers, the tax came into effect July 1.
Shuffling the Deck
Changes came to the premier’s cabinet in the middle of June, however the switch-up to one portfolio was not driven by political reasons; but personal ones.
Fisheries, Forestry and Agriculture Minister Derrick Bragg, who led provincial discussions to try to find a solution to the crab dispute, shared publicly that he had been diagnosed with cancer of the tongue and was undergoing treatment. Rumours of Bragg’s illness had been brewing, and he received a standing ovation after fielding questions in the House of Assembly on May 4.
An emotional Premier Andrew Furey named Bragg as a minister without a portfolio. Elvis Loveless would take over Bragg’s portfolio, while John Abbott would take Transportation and Infrastructure. Paul Pike would enter cabinet for the first time as Minister of Children, Seniors and Social Development.
Bragg rang the Bell of Hope on August 30.
