CNMI Homeland Security and Emergency Management special assistant Marvin K. Seman, second from right, operates an unmanned aerial drone as Police Sgt. Thomas Blas and Homeland Security staff Jesse Aldan look on during yesterday\u2019s search efforts for missing Chinese businessman Jian Zhu Deng at Banzai Cliff in Marpi. Also in the photo walking on the cliff line is police officer Jesse Stole. (Ferdie de la Torre)<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nSeman said this ensures that they have communication with the U.S. Coast Guard and government agencies such as Department of Public Safety\u2019s Boating Safety Unit, Commonwealth Ports Authority\u2019s Ports Police, and Department of Fire and Emergency Medical Services.<\/p>\nSeman said firefighters concentrated on the land-based coastal area.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo we have the water side searching and we also have a search of the jagged cliff lines,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Seman said they have the support from the Coast Guard with its Naval Helicopter Squadron HSC-25 since yesterday morning.<\/p>\n
He said Deng\u2019s family has been taking part in the search as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are trying to caution them because of the weather and the situation, the cliff line and jagged area,\u201d Seman said.<\/p>\n
DPS Boating Safety Unit commander Sgt. Thomas Blas said they sent out their fireboat and rescue boat, while CPA joined the search with their harbor patrol boat.<\/p>\n
Blas said Boating Safety officers aboard jet skis went as close as they can to the cliff line.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut as you can see we have huge waves breaking the cliff line and that\u2019s preventing us from getting any closer and at the same time it\u2019s creating so much confusion in the water,\u201d he said in an interview at Banzai Cliff.<\/p>\n
Blas said they have not deployed divers since Tuesday because of the water condition. He said there is a high surf warning since Tuesday and it may continue today, Thursday.<\/p>\n
Blas said they have a boat waiting for the water to calm down.<\/p>\n
He said it was their first time to use a drone in the search and rescue operation and that it\u2019s been very helpful. Usually, they would send people to walk down the cliff lines, but now there is no need for that since the drone flies over and takes photos.<\/p>\n
Aside from a helicopter, the Coast Guard also deployed their cutter, Washington, to assist in the search.<\/p>\n
Acting DPS spokesman Jason Tarkong said police were notified that Deng was missing on Tuesday at 8:31am.<\/p>\n
Tarkong said the 51-year-old Deng left home Monday at 6pm to go fishing at Banzai Cliff and never returned home.<\/p>\n
Deng\u2019s wife, Fuwen Zhang, discovered him missing when she woke up on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Deng\u2019s Nissan Pathfinder was discovered by family members still parked at Banzai Cliff on Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n
Tarkong said high surf is hampering the search efforts.<\/p>\n
Deng is manager of the family-owned Deng Shi Auto Shop in Garapan. A known good swimmer, Deng started fishing since 2009 or 2010. Three of the couple\u2019s four children were born on Saipan, while the eldest was born in China.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A helicopter and an unmanned aerial drone were used yesterday to assist a search and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":210178,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[1133,328,6973,5884],"class_list":["post-210169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-banzai-cliff","tag-coast-guard","tag-jian-zhu-deng","tag-thomas-blas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210169"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210169\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/210178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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