39 Hours | Episode 1

Summary

Pipeline: Episode 1 - "39 Hours"

Host: Isabelle Stanley
Release Date: May 22, 2025
Producer: Bella Soames
Additional Reporting: Andrew Jehring
Sound Design: John Scott

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1. Introduction: A Day Turned Tragic

Isabelle Stanley opens the episode by immersing listeners in the harrowing experience of four professional divers trapped in an oil pipe beneath the Caribbean Sea off Trinidad and Tobago.

Isabelle Stanley [00:01]: "Seriously popular. This is a story about four men. You're listening to their voices now, trapped in an oil pipe 60ft underwater."

The incident occurred on February 25, 2022, when Faisal Kerban, Kazamali Junior, Rishi Nagasar, and Yusuf Henry were repairing a leaking underwater oil pipeline. Suddenly, they were sucked into the very pipe they were servicing, plunging hundreds of feet below the sea's surface.

Isabelle Stanley [01:05]: "This might sound like a horror film... but it isn't. These are four real men."

2. The Community's Grief and Quest for Justice

The tragedy not only devastated the families but also left the Trinidadian community in mourning. Memorials with the divers' photos adorned the town, demanding justice.

Kaz Ali [02:48]: "Four families are still suffering because four breadwinners died and in our view, were butchered by a system run by people who don't know what they're doing."

3. Uncovering the Layers of Betrayal

Isabelle delves into the complexities surrounding the incident, uncovering potential motives behind the lack of rescue efforts. Her investigation reveals lucrative contracts, lax safety standards, and opaque political ties that may have contributed to the divers' demise.

Isabelle Stanley [02:59]: "Following that question has taken me across the Atlantic Ocean... I've had to scrutinise the most powerful people in Trinidad."

4. The Heart of LMCS: Kaz Ali Sr. and Kaz Ali Jr.

Central to the story is LMCS (Land and Marine Contracting Services), owned by Kaz Ali Sr., who employs the divers. Kaz Sr.'s dedication to his work is mirrored by his son, Kaz Ali Jr., who was poised to take over the company.

Isabelle Stanley [08:24]: "Kaz and Catherine couldn't be more different... They've been together for almost 50 years."

The father-son dynamic adds emotional depth, especially as Kaz Sr. grapples with the loss of his son, Kaz Jr., who also perished in the tragedy.

Kaz Ali Jr. [12:11]: "It's been pretty painful, hasn't it?"

5. Personal Stories: Lives Interrupted

The episode features intimate interviews with the families of the divers, offering a glimpse into their lives and the void left by their sudden absence.

Silecia Carbon – Wife of Faisal:

Silecia Carbon [13:18]: "We had arranged funeral... but then they said..."

Vanessa – Wife of Rishi:

Vanessa [19:58]: "Only thing is I went to the washroom... and he ran to Nashik, he holds him from the crib and he started to hug him up and kiss him."

These personal anecdotes highlight the stark contrast between the divers' professional bravery and their personal lives, making the tragedy all the more poignant.

6. The Fateful Day: February 25, 2022

Isabelle recounts the events of the tragic day, detailing the routine operations that turned deadly. The divers were performing their tasks efficiently until the moment disaster struck.

Isabelle Stanley [22:36]: "It was no different. It was a Friday."

As they worked to remove a plug sealing the oil pipe, water levels began to rise abruptly. Despite being monitored, the rescue efforts failed, leaving the divers trapped.

Isabelle Stanley [22:38]: "On a boat just above them, another LMCS employee is monitoring their activities. On a screen he hears a splash. Then the screen goes blank."

7. The Aftermath: Grief and Questions

The recovery of the divers' bodies took over three days, intensifying the families' anguish and raising critical questions about the incident's handling.

Isabelle Stanley [24:19]: "What went wrong? Why were they sucked in? And how long were they alive inside that pipe?"

8. A Sole Survivor: Christopher Frank Woodjeram

A pivotal revelation comes with the introduction of Christopher Frank Woodjeram, the lone survivor of the tragedy. His account provides a crucial perspective on why the others were not rescued in time.

Christopher Frank Woodjeram [25:25]: "Our divers... should have survived too. They should have been rescued."

His testimony underscores the systemic failures that may have contributed to the loss of the four divers.

9. Ongoing Investigation and Unanswered Questions

Isabelle highlights the lack of responses from key organizations involved, such as Paria Fuel Trading Company and the Trinidad Coast Guard, leaving many questions unanswered.

Isabelle Stanley [26:34]: "We've contacted Pariah and the Trinidad Coast Guard for comment and have not received a response."

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Key Takeaways

• Tragic Incident: On February 25, 2022, four professional divers were sucked into an underwater oil pipe in Trinidad and Tobago, leading to their untimely deaths.
• Community Impact: The tragedy has deeply affected the local community, with memorials and ongoing demands for justice.
• Investigative Depth: The podcast uncovers potential negligence and systemic issues within the oil industry and local governance.
• Personal Stories: Interviews with the families of the divers add emotional weight, highlighting the personal losses behind the professional roles.
• Sole Survivor's Account: Christopher Frank Woodjeram's survival raises critical questions about rescue operations and systemic failures.
• Unanswered Questions: Ongoing investigations face silences from responsible organizations, leaving the truth obscured.

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Notable Quotes

• Isabelle Stanley [00:01]: "You're listening to their voices now, trapped in an oil pipe 60ft underwater."
• Kaz Ali [02:48]: "Four families are still suffering because four breadwinners died..."
• Kaz Ali Jr. [12:11]: "It's been pretty painful, hasn't it?"
• Christopher Frank Woodjeram [25:25]: "They should have been rescued."

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Next Episode Preview:
In the following installment of Pipeline, Isabelle Stanley continues her investigation, delving deeper into the political and corporate entanglements that may have led to the tragedy. Stay tuned for more revelations and untold stories.

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Contact & Support:
For more information or to support the podcast, reach out to [e-mail] or support Christopher Boodram here.

Transcript

[Isabel Stanley]

Seriously popular. This is a story about four men. You're listening to their voices now, trapped in an oil pipe 60ft underwater. It's pitch black and the pipe is so tight they can hardly move. There's thick, oily liquid burning their eyes and skin and they're choking on fumes. They're injured, and if they aren't rescued soon, they're going to die. Khan, everything all right with you? No.

[Christopher Frank Woodjeram]

Any element break?

[Isabel Stanley]

This might sound like a horror film too awful to be true, but it isn't. These are four real men. Their names are Faisal Kerban, Kazamali Junior Rishi Nagasar and Yusuf Henry. They are professional divers from the Caribbean island of Trinidad and Tobago. And the day this recording was taken, Friday 25th February, 2022, they were doing their jobs, fixing a leak in an underwater oil pipe, when something went horribly wrong. They were sucked into the very pipe they were repairing and dragged hundreds of feet beneath the sea. And despite multiple opportunities, they weren't rescued. They were left to die inside that Pip. This story, their story, is one of betrayal. This was no act of God or mere unlucky accident cruelty.

[Vanessa]

He laughed. Laughter at us and the families and bravery.

[Isabel Stanley]

It actually made me stronger to realize.

[Vanessa]

The world that we live in.

[Isabel Stanley]

It's a story that changed both the nation and the lives of four families who have been failed time and time again.

[Kaz Ali]

Four families are still suffering because four breadwinners died and in our view, were butchered by a system run by people who don't know what they're doing.

[Isabel Stanley]

And it's a story that poses a question, why were those four men left to die deep beneath the sea? Following that question has taken me across the Atlantic Ocean. It's led me to lucrative contracts, failing safety standards and secretive political relationships. I've had to scrutinise the most powerful people in Trinidad.

[Catherine Ali]

The government minister is present, the board is present, the management is present, The Coast Guard is present. And the only thing that does not happen is an attempt at.

[Isabel Stanley]

And we may even have triggered an early election.

[Kaz Ali]

I think that one of the factors that would have influenced the decision to call the election so early. They want to preempt this podcast series.

[Isabel Stanley]

For me, this all started by chance last summer, when I first heard those men's voices. I was scrolling through comments on a Reddit thread when something caught my eye. It was a link to that recording I listened to, and that set in motion a hunt for answers that's continued to this day. And along the way, it turned into the most shocking story I've ever covered. I'm Isabel Stanley and you're listening to Pipeline, episode one, 39 hours. It's February 2025, and I've just landed in Trinidad from Wintry New York. I'm here with my colleagues Bella and Andy to speak to everyone we can about the day those men were sucked into that pipe. Okay, she's going left over. I'll pull it up on my phone as well, in case. We're heading an hour's drive south to San Fernando, the town at the center of our story. It's where our four divers, Kazim, Faisal, Yusuf and Rishi, lived with their families. When you think of Trinidad, you might picture tropical beaches, white sands and palm trees. Well, forget all of that. San Fernando is the industrial capital of the island. It's an oil town. As we drive south towards it, the rainforest is replaced by swathes of flat ground covered with giant silos and sprawling sets of pipes that shoot off in all directions. And when we drive into the town itself, it feels like an afterthought hastily built to slot around the infrastructure. Houses and roads are dotted around bits of pipe. Well, the most striking thing, I think, is everywhere. There's either sort of active oil infrastructure or there's crumbling tanks. Wherever you are, wherever you look, that's what you see and that's what you notice. Oil and gas have been Trinidad's biggest export since the 1960s, and the country still has vast offshore reserves. San Fernando neighbours the country's only refinery, so almost everyone that lives here is connected to the industry in some way. As we drive into town, the streets narrow and fill with crowds of people. No matter which road we go down, there's one thing that's impossible to miss. Our four divers faces are everywhere. And just to the right a second, the first thing you see is you check to check if there are cars coming. There is a sign of with a picture of the four men who died. Their wide smiles beam at us from posters stuck on telephone poles and giant boards at roundabouts and intersections. Each board has the exact same photo on it. Our four men stand in full dive gear on a platform by the sea, grinning at the camera. There's Faisal, the eldest of our four divers, and a father figure to the group. Rishi, known as Blacks to his friends. A new father to a baby boy named Nashik Yusuf, the life and soul of the party, privately dealing with the terrible bereavement. And there's Kazim, the promising young businessman on the cusp of taking over his Father's company. Beneath the photo, all the boards have the same slogan. We want justice now. We can't breathe. Okay, and then this was all LMCs. On the day of the tragedy, our divers were working for a company called LMCS that stands for Land and Marine Contracting Services. LMCS's offices are halfway between San Fernando and the oil refinery and it's one of our first stops. When we arrive, a smiling man in his late 60s bustles to the door to greet us and ushers us inside. This is Qazim Ali Sr. But everyone calls him Kaz. Kaz owns LMCS and he is very important to our story for two reasons. Not only did all our divers work for him, one of our divers, Kazem Ali Jr. Was his son.

[Kaz Ali Jr.]

Two days back to back, he was on one side, I was on the next side.

[Isabel Stanley]

Oh, so you could sit opposite each other.

[Silecia Carbon]

Yeah, and get the work done without having to go to a meeting.

[Isabel Stanley]

And that's Kaz's wife, Catherine. It gets slightly confusing because they call their son Kaz too. So from now on I'll refer to them as Kaz and Kaz Jr.

[Silecia Carbon]

This wasn't a separate room, it was an open office.

[Isabel Stanley]

At first glance, Kaz and Catherine couldn't be more different. Catherine is a calm Irish academic from Limerick who runs social justice programs on the island. Kaz, meanwhile, is practical through and through. He spent decades in the oil industry and when he shakes your hand, you feel the years he spent doing complex labour in his knuckles. But it works. They've been together for almost 50 years. In February 2022, when our story begins, LMCS was working on a job for one of his clients, Paria Fuel Trading Company. Paria is an arm of Trinidad's state owned oil company. It manages a lot of the oil infrastructure we've seen dotted around the island. And when something needs repairing, which it often does, Paria will bring in a third party contractor like LMCS to do it. The job Paria hired LMCS for in February 2022, the job at the center of our story, was a pretty big one. They had to repair a leaking stretch of underwater oil pipeline about 400 meters off the coast of San Fernando. Kaz and his son Kaz Jr were managing the project together. Kaz Jr was starting to take on more responsibility so that one day he could eventually step up and take over LMCs. When his father retired, Kaz did all the admin work.

[Silecia Carbon]

Jon Kass did all the the project work. Out in the field, he Had a very good relationship with his father, so they formed a good team.

[Isabel Stanley]

It sounds like he was following in your footsteps. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Silecia Carbon]

He wanted to be like him. He wanted to work with him and be like him. He admired him.

[Isabel Stanley]

Everything was going well for LMCs and that job started off well too. Kaz brought in some of the best divers he knew, divers who had worked with him for years and who he trusted. Faisal, Yusuf and Rishi and Kaz junior Led their team. They carried out the project smoothly until the final day, Friday, February 25th, the day our divers were sucked into that pipe. When Kaz is telling us about his company and working with his son, his eyes are bright and he smiles every other sentence. But when he starts to talk about that day, he drums his fingers on the table and often rubs his eyes with his other hand. His voice is thick with emotion. How much time do you spend now thinking about this and trying to work out what and why it happened?

[Kaz Ali Jr.]

It's been pretty painful, hasn't it?

[Isabel Stanley]

Yeah, it's never altered my mind 25 hours a day for the last three years. On that day in 2022, Kaz was in a uniquely traumatic position. Not only were three of his employees trapped in an undersea pipe during a job he had hired them for, his son was too. And he had to balance his responsibilities as their employer with his terror as a father. Were you sort of operating as more of a father or as more of a business owner, do you think?

[Kaz Ali Jr.]

Oh, no. A father and an employer, both. The business was the last.

[Isabel Stanley]

Yeah.

[Kaz Ali Jr.]

In fact, from the time of the incident, we had done no business.

[Isabel Stanley]

Three years later. There's one thing that haunts Kaz more than any other. It's a number. And it jumped out at me too when I started reading about this story last summer. 39, 39 hours, that is. That's the number that was written on his son Kaz Jr. S autopsy as an estimation of how long he may have been alive inside that tiny oil drenched pipe. 39 hours. I saw that you had a second autopsy report done for Kazm. Why did you decide to have the second report?

[Silecia Carbon]

Well, when the bodies were taken to the mortuary, the government did its own autopsy there and we were advised to get our own independent autopsies. So we did autopsy.

[Kaz Ali Jr.]

We had actually arranged funeral.

[Silecia Carbon]

That's right. And then they said, today the funeral, we have to get the autopsy.

[Kaz Ali Jr.]

Now, he declared.

[Isabel Stanley]

And how did you feel when you saw the result that he may have been alive for up to 39 hours?

[Kaz Ali Jr.]

39 hours. That was the killer.

[Isabel Stanley]

You might be wondering now, like I was last year, if our divers were alive for hours, why weren't they rescued? It's a question that has tormented Kaz and Katherine for over three years. Kaz is going to be a key character in this story. As the owner of lmcs, he knows the divers and the job perhaps better than anyone. But as Bella and I leave his office after hearing about the trauma he lives with every day, it's hard to see him as anything other than a grieving father mourning the loss of his only son. You can't mention his son's name without crying. What was interesting as well is that Catherine clearly has thought so much about it, but has kind of managed to come to terms with it, it seems, through her sort of like spirituality almost. Whereas he is. He was like, I think about this 25 hours a day. Yeah. Kaz and Katherine aren't the only ones haunted by that day. There are three other families whose lives have been permanently changed and we're on our way to meet them now. Nice to meet you. This is Bella.

[Nicole]

Follow me and then we'll go to the restroom. So this is where we at. All our life we have been here. My husband and I, we had joined this club roughly over about 20 years. Wow. More than 20. Good afternoon, sir.

[Silecia Carbon]

Nice to meet you.

[Nicole]

How are you?

[Isabel Stanley]

We've arrived at San Fernando Yacht Club, a breezy open air bar looking out over the calm, flat waters of the Caribbean. There are pelicans diving into the water, ships lining the dock, and It's a balmy 24 degrees.

[Nicole]

So this is my friend. Yeah, this is Imran. Hi. That's my name for him, right? You can tell them your real name.

[Isabel Stanley]

What's your real name? That's so far from what she.

[Catherine Ali]

What are we drinking?

[Nicole]

Well, I want to.

[Isabel Stanley]

This is Silechi Carbon. She's the wife of one of our divers, Faisal. She's a regular here and as you can probably hear, she's a fun person to have lunch with.

[Nicole]

Look how funny this is. The name of the Bluetooth here is Bluetooth.

[Isabel Stanley]

This place is important to Silecia. She first met Faisal just down the road.

[Nicole]

I was out sweeping the drain, doing the tours and he passed by and he said, new thing in tongue. So I raised my head. I was like, oh, this guy is good looking. I was like, all right, that's why it started.

[Silecia Carbon]

Wow.

[Isabel Stanley]

How old were you when he proposed?

[Nicole]

18. Yeah, 18. Wow.

[Isabel Stanley]

Okay, so you were young. Yeah, yeah. And it sounds like you were very happy. Oh, yeah.

[Nicole]

Not a problem in the world.

[Silecia Carbon]

Yeah.

[Nicole]

38 years of marriage.

[Isabel Stanley]

Even after three decades, she tells me they still like to wear matching outfits.

[Nicole]

Yes, at some times. Yeah.

[Isabel Stanley]

Yeah.

[Nicole]

And it naturally happens sometimes, you know, I out with a function with my daughter, one of the kids, and he'll come join us, and it's like, oh, you wear the same color.

[Isabel Stanley]

Sitting having lunch with Salisha. Her good mood is infectious, and it's easy to forget the reason we've come to see her. But it only takes one glance out to sea to remind me of why we're here. Oil rigs and tankers loiter on the horizon, and there's a mess of pipes near the shore. Faisal had been diving since he was a teenager. According to Silecia, he was one of the best and safest workers around. Did he worry about the safety of it throughout his career?

[Nicole]

No, never, never worry. That was the safest man I could have worked with. Yeah.

[Isabel Stanley]

Did you ever worry?

[Nicole]

No.

[Isabel Stanley]

No.

[Nicole]

Because I know if he is there in a job, everything gonna get done and it's gonna get done in the right way. I Never worry.

[Isabel Stanley]

And the 25th of February, 2022, the day our story starts, was no different. It was a Friday. So like they did every other week, Silesia and Faisal were going to meet at the club for their favorite activity, dinner and dancing. So that morning, Silecia waved Faisal off to work without a second thought, safe in the knowledge that she would see him in just a few hours. Although Celisia didn't think twice about it at the time, she's given that morning her final moments with her husband a lot of thought. Since they wake early, Faisal makes her a coffee, and Celicia hands him his packed lunch.

[Nicole]

He caught this fish, nice fish. So I cooked it. He gone to work with it. So I said, I give you a half your head a piece, and I leave my head in the fridge. Don't touch it when you come home, because we fight for the head. So he got half, I got half.

[Isabel Stanley]

Fish in hand, Faisal heads down to the dock to meet our other three divers. It's just a short drive from his house. It's raining. A miserable, dark morning. But it's an exciting day. Not just because it's the weekend and the job is almost over, but because one of Faisal's friends, one of our divers, Yusuf, is returning to work. Yusuf has been off because two of his brothers have recently died just days apart.

[Imran]

It was a big celebration when he.

[Isabel Stanley]

Came back that's Yousef's mother, Nicole.

[Imran]

A cheerful person that whenever he come around, he would just have the place. So, you know, happy, lively, that's the type of person he was. He would be at a workplace, regardless of whatever he's doing, he's either singing, dancing, he make it fun. Regardless of what he doing, he make it fun.

[Isabel Stanley]

So Faisal is happy to see him. Rishi, our fourth diver, is there too. He was a little slow to leave his house.

[Vanessa]

It was a normal day as any normal day.

[Isabel Stanley]

This is Vanessa, Rishi's wife.

[Vanessa]

Only thing is I went to the washroom and I was doing laundry and I heard his van left because he said he was leaving. I heard the van come back, he turned and come back because Nashik didn't get up yet.

[Isabel Stanley]

Nashik is Rishi's baby son. In 2022, he is 2 years old.

[Vanessa]

I still at the washroom and I hear in the footsteps because his boots, I'm hitting his boots, running up the step. I was like, what you doing? He said, I ain't got to kiss this child and hug him up and play with him. And he ran to Nashik, he holds him from the crib and he started to hug him up and kiss him.

[Isabel Stanley]

So he left for work and then came back to kiss.

[Vanessa]

To kiss baby Nashik. Yeah.

[Isabel Stanley]

Once everyone has arrived, our four divers, Faisal, Rishi, Youssef and Kaz Jr board a boat and head off to the set of oil pipes a few hundred metres offshore. When they get there, they go through their usual process. They discuss the jobs for the day and the safety precautions they have to take. They'll be working 15ft underwater in an air filled room. There's been specially fitted around the pipe they need to repair. So, meetings complete, they don their scuba gear and get ready to swim down to the entrance of the underwater room. Just before they climb down into the water, they pause and pose for a photo, grinning with their scuba tanks on their backs. It's the same photo we've seen plastered across billboards in San Fernando. It's the last photo of our divers alive. They sink below the waves and swim down before popping up into the room. It's noisy and cramped. There's an air compressor whirring loudly in the background, pumping fresh air in. And there in the middle is the 30 inch wide pipe they have to repair. Our divers work efficiently that morning and after lunch they are ready for the final step, removing a plug that is sealing the pipe. Just as they begin to remove it, the water level starts to rise. On a boat just above them, another LMCS employee is monitoring their activities. On a screen he hears a splash. Then the screen goes blank. The next time our four divers families see them, days later, they're dead.

[Nicole]

Monday, they was taken out the pipe.

[Isabel Stanley]

Celicia again. Faisal's wife.

[Nicole]

Yeah, they was taken out. And then we go up to the forensic to identify the body.

[Isabel Stanley]

At first, when Selisha goes down to the mortuary to identify her husband's body, she can't recognize him.

[Nicole]

His body was swollen and the oil get them dark and. And I rolled back his sleeve, his wetsuit, to identify his watch, this and his watch, both the same time. And that's how I identify him.

[Isabel Stanley]

So you couldn't recognize him apart from.

[Nicole]

No, not really, no.

[Imran]

I think we were called in first two to view. My sister went in together with Yusuf's.

[Isabel Stanley]

Dad and that's Nicole talking about her son Yusuf.

[Imran]

It was him. And my sister identified him because he had a tattoo on his hand that said Outlaw, something like that. And the pathologist actually asked her, are you sure? And she said yes. She said, she took out her phone and she showed him she had a picture with him without his T shirt. And she said, look, the tattoo is here.

[Vanessa]

So I went in.

[Isabel Stanley]

So the bodies, Vanessa, Rishi's wife, you.

[Vanessa]

Really couldn't tell because they were swollen like three times the maximum of how they normally look. They were swollen, their eyes were popped, their face so big they were black with oil. Oil, thickers, mud. So I couldn't say like, you know, if it was him or not.

[Isabel Stanley]

It took over three days for our divers bodies to be recovered from that pipe. And as their families grieved, hundreds of questions took root in their minds. What went wrong? Why were they sucked in? And how long were they alive inside that pipe? I have trawled through hundreds of pages of evidence, hours of recording autopsy reports and corporate filings looking for answers to those questions. And there's one person who has helped me more than any other. The most important person in this story. Someone I haven't told you about yet. You remember those billboards that we saw driving through San Fernando? The ones with the last photo of our four divers alive? Well, there's a fifth man in that photo. A fifth man who was working with our divers and who was sucked into that pipe with them that day. But there's something different about him. He survived.

[Christopher Frank Woodjeram]

My name is Christopher Frank Woodjeram. I am the sole survivor of the Paria diving tragedy in 2022 On 25.

[Isabel Stanley]

February, Christopher managed to drag himself out of that pipe over the course of three long, dark hours. And Christopher says something remarkable. He says our divers, his friends, should have survived too. He says they should have been rescued. And ever since that day, he has been plagued by one question. Why weren't they? Next time on Pipeline.

[Christopher Frank Woodjeram]

I remember getting hull Turi pipe passing through that pipe at unbelievable speeds. If he and daddy alive and if we are alive, we have a chance to survive. I get to find out that these guys haven't been rescued yet. That hit me so hard because I couldn't understand.

[Isabel Stanley]

We've contacted Pariah and the Trinidad Coast Guard for comment and have not received a response. Pipeline is presented by me, Isabelle Stanley. This producer by Bella Soames. Sound design is by John Scott. Additional reporting by Andy Uring. Additional production by John Rogers. And our executive producer is Jamie East.