Day 45: Saved

You might think it sounds like the story of Robinson Crusoe or the Tom Hanks film "Cast Away", cast-aways adrift at sea, surviving barely on rain water and fish, whose only hope is to be rescued.  I truthfully can't even imagine what it would be like, with nothing around but miles of ocean.  The sun beating down on you with no place to hide.  Being so thirsty and just praying that it might rain to quench your thirst, even just briefly.  Feeling so alone, and lost, and forgotten.  But this isn't fiction, it's the story of three teenage boys from the South Pacific island Atafu Atoll, Tokelau, who were rescued after being adrift at sea for 50 days in a tiny aluminum boat. 

"The trio - Samuel Pelesa and Filo Filo, both 15, and Edward Nasau, 14 - told rescuers they survived on rainwater they collected, a handful of coconuts, raw fish and a seagull that landed on their 12-foot- (3.5-meter-) long aluminum boat.  

The boys set off Oct. 5 from their home island to one nearby.  It's not known how they went missing, but the outboard motor may have broken down at sea.

Worried family members reported them missing and the New Zealand air force launched a sea search.  No sign of the tiny boat was found, and the village of 500 people held memorial services, expecting never to see the boys again.

They were picked up Wednesday by a fishing trawler, undernourished, severely dehydrated and badly sunburned, but otherwise well.  The ship's first mate said the area they were in is way off any normal commercial shipping routes.

They drifted 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) from where they set out - Tokelau, a bucolic collection of coral atolls north of Samoa that is New Zealand's territory.

A Fiji navy patrol boat met the trawler Friday and escorted it into the harbor of its capital, Suva.  The teens were met by New Zealand consular officials and taken directly to a hospital for medical checks.  Looking thin, the three walked off the boat without speaking to reporters.

Tai Fredricsen, first mate aboard the tuna boat San Nikuna, said a crew member spotted a small vessel bobbing in the open sea northeast of Fiji on Wednesday.  "We knew it was a little weird," he said.

As it edged closer to investigate, the crew saw three people aboard waving frantically and asked them if they needed help.

"All they could say was 'thank you very much for stopping,'" Fredricsen told New Zealand's National Radio.  "In a physical sense, they look very physically depleted, but mentally - very high."

After the rescue, one of the boys managed to reach his grandmother by phone from the fishing boat.  As news of their survival spread, the village erupted in joy.

"It's a miracle, it's a miracle," said Tanu Filo, the father of Filo Filo.  "The whole village, they were so excited and cried and they sang songs and were hugging each other in the road.  Everybody was yelling and shouting the good news," he told Radio New Zealand International.

Fredricsen said the boys reported having just two coconuts with them when they set out.  During the ordeal, they drank rainwater that collected in the boat and ate fish they had caught.  Once, they managed to grab a bird that landed on the boat and they devoured that, Fredricsen said. 

The rescue came not a moment too soon: Fredricsen said they had begun to drink sea water because it hadn't rained in the past few nights." Seattle Times

Today there will be great joy and celebration as these boys are reunited with their families and friends.  Saved from the clutches of the sea, into the embrace of those that love them.

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