Daughter sails yacht to safety after father killed by pirates

by KIRK MAKIN

A Canadian woman piloted a 35-foot yacht through stormy seas off Honduras with her dead father?s body on board Friday to escape the scene of fatal attack by pirates.

Myda Egrmajer, 24, was nearing a large Australian vessel when her engine began smoking and then conked out, said her cousin, Eric van Riesen.

?She was adrift in the ocean,? Mr. van Riesen said. ?When push came to shove, she chased off the assailants and piloted this boat through heavy seas to get a passing ship to rescue her. She?s a tough cookie.?

The Australian crew rescued Ms. Egrmajer and picked up the body of her father, Milan Egrmejer, who was shot to death during the attack.

Last night Ms. Egrmajer, an international studies graduate of Trent University who once spent a year on a work program in Ecuador, was making plans to return to the solace of her tight-knit family in Ontario.

?How she is going to deal with the trauma when she gets home, we don?t know,? Mr. van Riesen said in an interview.

Ms. Egrmajer managed to stay out of sight last Thursday night when four pirates climbed aboard her father?s Ericson 35 sailing yacht, the Adena. Mr. Egrmajer, a semi-retired engineer who had been sailing in Central America since 2008, was shot four times at close range, according to a local report.

Mr. van Reisen said that his uncle was aware of the dangers involved in ocean sailing, and that he was physically strong, but not the type of ?belligerent? person who would have challenged the pirates.


?My hunch is that he would have said: ?Here, take this stuff and leave us alone,?? Mr. van Riesen said. ?But obviously things escalated. I don?t know what type of threats there were or how much of a hothead one of these people may have been. The next thing you know, guns are going off.?

The Egrmajers had decided last Thursday to camp on a riverbank near the sea after the ocean turned stormy. They sought shelter in a remote lagoon called El Diamante, where boaters regularly overnight.

Mr. van Riesen said that his uncle was an outdoorsman who had a passion for sailing. ?He had an opportunity to fulfill a dream, and he was living that dream,? he said. ?He was a very sociable person; he was always someone you could just sit down and share stories with.?

Mr. Egrmajer had posted occasional entries on a blog and, according to his website, did long distance consulting work from his yacht for his company, Egrmajer Consulting Inc.

Divorced from his wife, Wila, Mr. Egrmajer also had a son, Ivan.




JUSTICE REPORTER? From Monday's Globe and Mail
Published Sunday, Dec. 05, 2010 2:24PM EST
Last updated Monday, Dec. 06, 2010 2:39PM EST