Students gather supplies to be sailed to Puerto Rico

The supplies are sailing to Puerto Rico, and on Tuesday, students from New London's Bennie Dover Middle School got a lesson on this global humanitarian effort.

Students not only got a sailing lesson from NESS, the New England Science and Sailing Foundation, but learned how the large sailing sketch will be making its way to Puerto Rico with much-needed supplies from various Connecticut ports, like Stonington.

"Stewardship is really important to us so we can show them what international stewardship looks like by showing them that this sailboat here is going to provide relief to Puerto Rico and also to Haiti as well," said Ben Yanni, operations director of NESS.

Sequoia Sun is the captain of Tandemeer, who plans on taking the supplies to the smaller outlying islands.

"We're going to go to Calibre and Vieques, which are two little islands off the east coast they're not getting much help. They don't have food, they don't have water. They don't have much," Sun said.

Over the next couple of weeks, the sailboat will stop at various ports along the eastern seaboard, filling its hold and cabin with food and supplies, including 350 pairs of donated shoes.

If you're looking to catch up with Tandemeer, it will be leaving New London on Thursday for Essex, and then Norwalk and New York City.