Kenya travel advice – Boat trips

Kenya travel update: Briton’s death in Kenya sparks warning:

Please do not use local boats for trips as they do not meet health and safety standards most do not have life jackets..

A spokeswoman for African Safari Club said they already warned customers that some private boat trips in Mombasa might not meet minimum health and safety standards and not carry adequate insurance.

Siobhan Meadwell, 19, from Wigan, Greater Manchester, died last week after she and her boyfriend, as well as another British couple, took a deep-sea fishing boat trip.

She died after the locally hired boat capsized in rough seas.

A Foreign Office spokesman said her boyfriend was also injured but was released from hospital on Saturday. Two others were also involved.

Her boyfriend, Craig Fairclough, was rescued by another fishing boat. He was discharged from hospital on Saturday after four days in hospital.

There have been reports that the fishing boat the holidaymakers hired did not have any life jackets onboard and there was no safety routine.

“We include the warning in our pre-travel literature and we also mention it during the welcome meeting at the start of the holiday,” she said.

“We will have to discuss whether we make this advice stronger.

“Some of the local operators in Mombasa are really good but it’s very difficult to tell who are the ones to trust.

“Everybody here is really shocked. A lot of our customers book with local operators and nothing like this has happened before.”

The couple had been staying at the Dolphin Hotel in the Kenyan resort on a two-week holiday.