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Canoe departs Palau for Guam, Saipan
Alingano Maisu departs Palau on April 30, 2023, and will travel to Yap, Woleai, and Satawal, It will then sail to Guam and Saipan. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)
A double-hulled voyaging canoe called Alingano Maisu departed from the NECO Marine Harbor in Malakal in Palau last April 30, 2023, under the direction of Micronesian Voyaging Society and in partnership with Palau Community College. The canoe will travel to Yap, Woleai, and Satawal, It will then sail to Guam and Saipan.
Upon returning, the final leg of Alingano Maisu’s journey will make a stop at Guam and onward to Satawal and Yap before returning to Palau.
The canoe’s crew members are Sesario Sewralur (captain and master navigator), Miano Sowraenpiy, Allen Yalisman, Landon Moss Sewralur, Snyder Taisakan, Jada Marie S. Rabauliman, Beouch Ogumoro Ngirchongor, Gregoria Olopai, Latoya Ruth Laniyu Cantu, Mitchel Myron Olopai Sablan, Ervin Olopai, Leslie Gulibert, Kazuyo Hayashi, Rilang Roberto, and Benito Mario Jacob.
Alingano Maisu is a 56-foot doubled-hulled voyaging canoe that was built in Hawaii by the members of the Nā Kālai Wa’a O Hawai’i, a group of canoe builders and voyagers from the Pacific islands.
The canoe was built as a gift of gratitude to master navigator Dr. Pius Mau Piailug who had revived the non-instrumental navigation techniques of Polynesia by sharing his knowledge of navigation during the 1976 voyage of Hōkūle’a from Hawaii to Tahiti. Piailug, who was from the island of Satawal in Yap, is the father of Sewralur, Alingano Maisu’s captain and master navigator.
In 2008, PCC established a Non- Instrumental Navigation Program that aims to revive and preserve the practice of non-instrumental navigation that is traditional to the people of the Pacific islands. (PCC)
