On May 17, 2025, the Mexican Navy ship Cuauhtémoc – an elegant tall ship glimmering with lights in the evening twilight – was leaving the South Street Seaport in New York City when a freak accident occurred. For reasons under investigation, perhaps related to mechanical failure, tidal currents in the East River, prevailing winds, and/or human error, the sailing ship thrust quickly in reverse – in the wrong direction – toward the Brooklyn Bridge. Its three masts collided with the span, causing them to snap and topple. 

In keeping with maritime tradition when a sailing vessel is entering or leaving a port, crew members of the Cuauhtémochad climbed the masts and riggings – a ritual called “manning the yards” – to bid New York adios. The ship was on its way to Iceland as part of an eight-month tour of duty for the sailors with plans to visit 22 ports in 15 countries. 

Two of the cadets manning the yards were killed when the ship’s masts hit the bridge.

The Cuauhtémoc is a training vessel for cadets from the Mexican Heroic Naval Military Academy. It is one of four sister ships built for Latin American navies in the shipyards in Balboa, Spain in the early 1980s. Cuauhtémoc’s sisters, also used as training ships, are Colombia’s Gloria, Ecuador’s Guayas, and Venezuela’s Simón Bolívar. 

The tall ships are the ceremonial pride of their respective navies. The vessels participate in tall ship races and regattas and play an ambassadorial role, sharing their culture and history at ports around the world. This was the 43^rd training voyage of Cuauhtémoc. There were 277 people on board, 179 were cadets (although the exact number varies in different accounts). In 2011, the Mexican Navy opened its training tours to women. 

The ship remained docked in New York City for repairs until October 4^th when it embarked for its home port in Cozumel. In early November, it continued its training voyage – but with a much-abbreviated itinerary. It will visit only three ports of call in Mexico. 

Cuauhtémoc’s training voyage was intended to commemorate the 200^th anniversary of a naval blockade in 1825 led by Pedro Sainz Baranda, one of the founders of the Mexican Navy. It led to the final expulsion of Spanish troops from their last stronghold on Mexican soil at San Juan de Ulúa, a fortress overlooking Veracruz on the Gulf of Mexico. The victory marked the culmination of the Mexico’s long-fought independence from Spain. To underscore the country’s tortuous history with Spain, this year also marks the 500^th anniversary of the execution in 1525 of Cuauhtémoc, the last Aztec emperor, by Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés. 

The cadets who died were América Yamileth Sánchez from Xalapa, Veracruz and Adal Jair Maldonado from San Mateo del Mar, Oaxaca. She was 20. He was 23. 

Flor de la vida – the prime of life – two young cadets on a voyage around the world, standing as it were on top of the world, watching the glittering skyline of New York City, waving at people gathered on the pier. Then in a few freak seconds the theater of their lives went dark. América and Adal, gone. Just like that. Bereft, baffled, heart-broken families, friends, fellow cadets left to question what went wrong. The brief onslaught in their home towns of camera-wielding voyeurs masquerading as the news media. Privacy is hard won in these times. At least in the fishing village of San Mateo del Mar, which is located in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec of Oaxaca where people are known for their standoffishness, the family of Adal seems to have successfully alluded the vultures of media. All the video footage I could find showed the alcade – the mayor – standing on a virtually empty street (a few passersby with their backs turned) speaking on behalf of the family. 

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board is charged with determining the cause of the accident, who was at fault. https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/Pages/DCA25MM039.aspx As of this posting, the investigation is “ongoing” – such a vague, stalling, and patronizing word. Of course, the search for cause, should one be found, is all about liability and lawsuits. Finding cause does not rewind the clock, and there’s never solace in an explanation. América and Adal are dead. 

The churning river of time moves swiftly on. And the voracious media rushes off to a never-ending banquet of deaths, maiming, fires, floods, disasters. On November 1, as people all over Mexico were in the midst of celebrating Día de los Muertos – Day of the Dead – an explosion and fire, apparently from a faulty transformer, killed 24 people, including 6 children, in Waldo’s, a grocery store in Hermosillo, Sonora. 

Every so often I pick up Robert Frost. A few months ago I stumbled on his poem “Out, Out—”  about a boy in the flower of life who died in a freak accident. 

… “No one believed. They listened at his heart.
Little – less – nothing! – and that ended it. 
No more to build on there. And they, since they
Were not the dead one, turned to their affairs.”