Fishermen spot boat filled with 20 corpses floating off the coast of northeastern Brazil, reports say

Local news reports say a small boat full of decomposing corpses has been spotted by fishermen off Brazil’s northeastern coast. Photo / AP

A small boat full of decomposing corpses was spotted by fishermen off Brazil’s northeastern coast on Saturday, according to local news reports.

Brazil’s Attorney-General’s office said in a statement it has dispatched a forensics team to the area to determine where the bodies and the boat came from.

“Some reports say there could be up to 20 corpses” in the boat, the Attorney-General’s office said in a statement. The office announced it is opening criminal and civil investigations into the incident.

The boat was floating off the coast of the state of Para in a remote location about 300km from the state capital, Belem.

It’s not the first time vessels carrying dead bodies have been spotted by fishermen in the western side of the Atlantic Ocean. In 2021, at least seven boats full of corpses washed up in Brazil and the eastern Caribbean.

Investigations by the Associated Press and local authorities determined some of these boats carried the corpses of African migrants who were trying to make it to the Canary Islands, but had missed their target and had drifted for weeks in the Atlantic Ocean.