Scrubber, Wazza and a suspect boat

Two of them wove their way through the mangroves to the mouth of the Daintree River, where they were “rescued” by passing fishers Barry Preston and Justin Ward.

The duo shouted the two refugees a now-legendary fishing trip along the river, including going mud-crabbing and croc-spotting, before turning the men over to police at the Wonga Beach boat ramp.

Two other immigrants, believed to be the skipper of the vessel and his first mate, appeared to have camped the night in the rainforest on a cattle property, phoning ahead to a friend to be picked up by a van being driven south from Cape Tribulation.

The property owner, a local known as “Wazza”, had his dogs going berserk that night and only pieced what had happened together when he caught sight of the pair walking past his home the next morning.

He raced ahead of them, up the road, and photographed the men getting into the white Toyota HiAce van with P-plates.

When Wazza hopped out of his vehicle to question the male driver about why he was allegedly helping the two es- capees, the driver shrugged the questions off, and drove away.

Wazza made it to the car ferry ahead of the van and warned the Daintree car ferry operators.

When the van drove onto the ferry, barge driver Mick Lilley asked whether he had any passengers.

“I said to him ‘do you have anyone on-board’, because there were no police or anyone here – not like the day before, when there were police searching all the cars,” he said.

“There was no Border Force, no cops, or anything.”

Mr Lilley caught sight of the two men hiding in the back of the van, crouching down to avoid any prying eyes.

He went around the back of the vehicle and opened its doors.

“I said ‘come on, you fellas, out of there – come on’,” he said. “I grabbed them and stuck them in the room on the ferry, and just held them there, and we rang the police.

“They took about half an hour to get here.”

Mossman police took the two men into custody, and soon after they left for the police station, water police and Border Force eventually arrived at the scene.

Mr Lilley said if it were not for keen-eyed locals, the refugees would have easily escaped. “If Wazza hadn’t have said anything, no one would have known they were in that van, and they would have been long gone,” he said.

The 17 Vietnamese nationals who came ashore at the Dain- tree were flown from Cairns to be taken into detention on Christmas Island, off WA.

Questions still remain, however, as to how they managed to make it so far without being detected by the Maritime Border Command – comprised of Australian Defence Force and ABF – which has previously