Honduran police exaine the boat where Milan Egrmajer was killed. A Canadian tourist on an extended sailing trip was shot and killed in northern Honduras, while his daughter survived the violent robbery attempt, a family member said Saturday. Milan Egrmajer, 55, of Ottawa was killed after gunmen boarded his sailboat Thursday night, his former brother-in-law Kelly Wilson said, speaking from Mahone Bay, N.S. Egrmajer, a semi-retired consulting engineer, had left on his trip from Port Dalhousie, Ont., a year and a half ago. In November, his 24-year-old daughter, Myda, decided to join him in the Caribbean, Wilson said.La Prensa
A Canadian woman who saw gunmen kill her father in Honduras described her ordeal in a CBC interview Friday, tearfully recalling the "awful" feeling she had leaving his body behind when she was rescued.
"I just felt alone and really afraid, just scared," Myda Egrmajer, 24, said in a television interview broadcast Friday.
The CBC interview was the first time Ms. Egrmajer had spoken publicly since her father Milan Egrmajer, 55, was gunned down on his boat last week.
Myda, who had travelled to Central America to spend time with her father, said bad weather made them decide to take shelter in a remote lagoon.
Myda said she became nervous on the evening of Dec. 2 when a boat pulled up with four men who claimed to have engine trouble.
"They didn't really look like nice people," she said.
Her father was shot four times when he leaned over to help one of the men close a pocket knife, Myda said.
"I couldn't believe it, I can still hear the gun in my ear, he just did it."
Her father had left a flare gun nearby and Myda said she picked it up and waved it and started yelling at the men, who left.
After checking her father and realizing he was dead, she figured out how to use the boat's radio and sent a mayday that was answered by the Honduran coast guard.
She spent a lonely night on the boat - the flare gun in her hand - until the next day when a plane with U.S. Coast Guard markings flew overhead.
"I was so happy," a tearful Myda said.
An oil tanker came to her rescue, but she had to leave her father's body behind.
"It was awful," Myda said in hushed tones.
"In my head I said 'sorry Dad, I'm sorry,"' a sobbing Myda told the CBC.
She was taken to Belize where Canadian diplomats helped arrange her return to her family in northern Ontario.
Honduran authorities have said they have made no arrests in the killing.