Man Washes up in Marshall Islands 'After 16 Months Adrift'

[cortezsailor]

One of the interesting things steve Callahan showed in Adrift was that in those 76 days he used everything on that liferaft to make tools to help himself out of the situation. When he was finally rescued he had dried fish hanging everywhere

In this current one, without more than crappy media reports, it seems he only came ashore with one turtle on board. But if it was Steve Callahan, or you, or me, wouldnt we have saved every turtle shell for water catches? Saved the bones to make scrapers, harpoons, knives, spoons, blood holders and saved the sinus to make lines for fishing.




Mark [/QUOTE]


Smart doesn't always win.

Sometimes you just get lucky man!

[rgscpat]

Don't know whether folks saw this:
Castaway is released from hospital in Marshall Islands - CNN.com

[stara]

the whole ordeal would've been avoided with a simple set of oars on board the fishing boat. They drifted three days in sight of land and could've simply rowed back to shore if they just would've had secondary means of propulsion such as oars.

This event could be a great opportunity for making lives of millions of third world fishermen safer...

1) start a charitable action to educate fishermen to always have secondary means of propulsion on board, i.e. oars. The survivor's story is great vehicle to get attention to the topic

2) Engage United Nations for funding the project, remember Panga design originated same way. Now add oars to Pangas and other open fishing boats

3) Every run down to Mexico etc. add event where donate oars to local fishermen, this could help bringing local communities and cruisers together contributing to goodwill etc.

4) Start open design project to optimise oar design and manufacturing process suitable for third world . Use United Nations funding to start oar manufacturing in these third world countries creating jobs there and improving safety of fishing.

5) then make a Hollywood movie out of the whole thing - the second part of oar making really makes it an interesting story

[SaltyMonkey]

So, lets see, they're going to row back from 90+ miles and growing in a major storm and boo coo waves against the North Equatorial and NE California Current, most likely without any compass, and so oon. Oh very interesting.

[MarkJ]

The article linked by Rgscpat is not too bad, CNN actually must have employed a journalist...
Interesting that they use vague terms every time they mention the alleged journey. " Jose Salvador Alvarenga, the mysterious castaway who turned up in the Marshall Islands last week, has been released from a hospital." The word 'mysterious' and phrase 'turned up'. Normal sensationalist journalism is much more direct.

The article is the first that I have read about investigating the claims, so I cut and pasted them here.

Official: His story is probable
Alvarenga's claims have garnered widespread skepticism about how he could survive for 13 months adrift in the Pacific. But from what officials can tell, they have no reason to doubt him.
"The investigations into Mr. Alvarenga's story so far have been substantiated," Phillip Muller, the Marshall Islands' foreign affairs minister, said Thursday.
Christian Clay-Mendoza, a Mexican diplomat working on Alvarenga's case, said that the castaway was an undocumented worker in Mexico, but that "what he has said to us about his identity, so far, has been true."
"The main question now is how long was he at sea," he said.
Clay-Mendoza said "it's probable" that Alvarenga did get lost at sea starting in December 2012, as the castaway has claimed.
If Alvarenga's story proves true, the trip across the Pacific would have taken him across roughly 6,600 miles (10,800 kilometers) of open ocean before ending in the Marshall Islands, about halfway between Hawaii and Australia, in the northern Pacific.

As mentioned somewhere else 'its probable' is a closer word to fact than 'possible' but less than the legal definitions of 'on the balance of probabilities'. At least there are people looking into it. And if the journey does prove to be true I'll certainly buy him a beer. But not a turtle soup dinner!

By the way, on one of our pacific passages, between galapagos and well before tonga, we were becalmed for a day or so and the ocean was covered in what I thought were black bags of rubbish. Maybe one every few hundred meters. They were turtles basking on the surface. We could sail right up to them. Mind you, then theres a few thousand miles of bugger all....

[Jimmy Jazz]

Hey Mark, any chance you have any pictures of the basking turtles that you could post. Cheers, Jimmy

[HappyMdRSailor]

Originally Posted by tropicalescape

Did you cut off the head and tail and let it bleed out or just throw it in a cooler with other fish and clean it when you got around to it? Were they small(I have eaten small dogfish but I bleed it out as soon as I caught it ,was ok)..Sharks do not "poopy"(ever seen any "shark ****"?) so if you leave the blood in it after you catch it,it will turn into ammonia due to the Urea ,very nasty stuff as I stated earlier,I couldnt eat even if I held my nose!! I have heard of folks getting busted for selling shark meat for Swordfish...

Bleeding out? In a word... Yes by my usual experiences, but not primarily the reason? The fish are usually 100-300 lb Mako and Thresher caught off the CA coast... Gaffed and tail tied after landing, and the head cut off when tied alongside... All this, and the "rest period" for landing means it's headless in the water for at least 15-30 min usually...

Shark is NEVER going to be confused with tuna, dorado, yellowtail, wahoo, or any other of my favorite YUMMY sportfish fare... Often it has a "tinny tuna" or I suppose slight ammonia flavor sometimes...Both have areas that contain more "sinew" between the grain of the meat... Mako is much better to eat... These I can cut dinner plate size cross sections into "1-1/2" steaks" for the grill.. Other ways to cook are 1-1/2" cubes marinated in a spicy soy/garlic/ginger homade Teriyaki, and kabobbed, or breaded and fried for tacos...

I can see being passed off as swordfish.... In my mind, the most overrated fish on a menu...

[jtsailjt]

Originally Posted by SaltyMonkey

So, lets see, they're going to row back from 90+ miles and growing in a major storm and boo coo waves against the North Equatorial and NE California Current, most likely without any compass, and so oon. Oh very interesting.

No need for a compass when every seafaring man knows the way you need to go when your motor breaks down is directly into the wind/waves! Oars or no oars, I think you were right, they weren't going to row 90 miles.

[HappyMdRSailor]

Originally Posted by cortezsailor

One of the interesting things steve Callahan showed in Adrift was that in those 76 days he used everything on that liferaft to make tools to help himself out of the situation. When he was finally rescued he had dried fish hanging everywhere

In this current one, without more than crappy media reports, it seems he only came ashore with one turtle on board. But if it was Steve Callahan, or you, or me, wouldnt we have saved every turtle shell for water catches? Saved the bones to make scrapers, harpoons, knives, spoons, blood holders and saved the sinus to make lines for fishing.
Mark

I would SOOOOOOO have to make a turtle shell hat....

I suppose I would have looked like one of those Japanese soldiers stranded on a island who still thought the war was on though ...

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Jazz

Hey Mark, any chance you have any pictures of the basking turtles that you could post. Cheers, Jimmy

This is the only one i can find, and there must have been others because the file has been renamed... I am sure I would have taken a wide photo showing more, but in a photo you might only see one.

This fellow, was, from memory about 4 feet long.

Oh, and the date stamp indicates it was between panama and Galapagos.


Notice its waving!!



.

[socaldmax]

Originally Posted by stara

the whole ordeal would've been avoided with a simple set of oars on board the fishing boat. They drifted three days in sight of land and could've simply rowed back to shore if they just would've had secondary means of propulsion such as oars.

This event could be a great opportunity for making lives of millions of third world fishermen safer...

1) start a charitable action to educate fishermen to always have secondary means of propulsion on board, i.e. oars. The survivor's story is great vehicle to get attention to the topic

2) Engage United Nations for funding the project, remember Panga design originated same way. Now add oars to Pangas and other open fishing boats

3) Every run down to Mexico etc. add event where donate oars to local fishermen, this could help bringing local communities and cruisers together contributing to goodwill etc.

4) Start open design project to optimise oar design and manufacturing process suitable for third world . Use United Nations funding to start oar manufacturing in these third world countries creating jobs there and improving safety of fishing.

5) then make a Hollywood movie out of the whole thing - the second part of oar making really makes it an interesting story

Great idea!

While we're at it, I've noticed a lot of cars with Baja plates spewing blue smoke and running on bald tires and they sound like they're missing their mufflers while they're driving around on the US side with no car insurance.

We could tie it into a "save the children" type of appeal. As Martin Sheen does the voiceover telling us how, "Millions of children are trapped inside of mufflerless, unsafe vehicles with bald tires and no auto insurance, driving millions of miles every year. Please help these innocent children who are the victims of circumstance and birth to overcome these dangerous conditions. Your generous donation of just 78 cents per day could help 3 children with new tires, a new exhaust system, a tune up and most importantly, auto insurance."

Then a close up shot of 8 filthy, snot covered kids looking out the rear window of an AMC Pacer as it clunks and smokes and backfires and slowly pulls away
from the camera and....

fade.


Yeah, I could totally direct the **** out of that commercial. We collect millions, send 7% down to Mexico and build mansions in Malibu and the Hamptons.

I gotta go do some mega yacht shopping!

[captain58sailin]

I think the "Gremlin" would be a more appropriate car for your commercial, cooler looking. As far as the oars go, if they wanted oars, they would have them. The local talent is very capable of producing their own oars. A hand compass might be a useful donation. How about rigging up some sails on their skiff?

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by captain58sailin

How about rigging up some sails on their skiff?

Would have shortened the 'sea time' for sure...
Man washes up in Marshalls after 4mths at sea...

[captain58sailin]

I once made a run south from AK to LA, we stayed 100 nm offshore, and when we got to Mexico we started coming across Ridley turtles, lots and lots of them, and every time we saw one, there was another one under it, I think they were giving their friends a ride. At least that far offshore there were plenty of turtles to eat.

[captain58sailin]

There you go, only he would have starved to death, he would have been going too fast to catch fish with his hands. I suppose they would have to have a dagger board, if they had sails, and you know after that, it means EPIRBs, AIS, GPS, finally the skiff would sink from the weight of all the safety gear.