Fisherman rescued after 95 days adrift, surviving on turtles

By eating turtles, birds and cockroaches, the 95 -day surviving fisherman was rescued and re -combined with his family.

The 61 -year -old Maximo Napa Castro began a two -week fishing trip on December 7 at Marcona Coastal Village.

In 10 days, the storm blown the boat.

His family began searching, but Peru’s maritime patrol could not find him.

The Ecuador Patrol ship Don F found 1,094 km (680 miles) on the coast by Wednesday and found it in dehydration and important.

Maximo survived by grabbing rain from the boat and eating what he could find.

On Friday, in his emotional reunion with his brother in Paita near the Ecuador border, he explained how he ate cockroaches and birds before relying on the sea turtle. His last 15 days were spent without food.

Castro said he gave his family a power to endure, including two months of granddaughter.

“I thought about my mother every day. I thank God for giving me the second opportunity.”

His mother, Elena, said in the local media that relatives were optimistic while their son disappeared, but began to lose hope.

After his structure, Mr. Castro was transferred to Paita for medical evaluation before flying to Lima, Peru.

There at Jorge Chávez International Airport, he met his daughter Inés Napa in an emotional reunion surrounded by media scrum. She welcomed him home with a bottle of Pessco, Peru’s national drink.

In the hometown of San Andrés in the ICA region, neighbors and relatives said they were decorated with celebration of Peru Media Agency RPP.

His nephew Leyla Torres Napa said he plans to celebrate his birthday while his family is getting lost in the sea.

She told the agency: “On the day of birth, everything he could eat was unique. [while at sea] Because it was a small cookie, it was very important to congratulate us because he was reborn to us. “

Last year, Mikhail Pikuin, Russia, was rescued after spending more than two months of drift from a small balloon boat in the Okhhotsk sea in eastern Russia.

Similarly, José Salvador Alvarenga, a Salvador fisherman, endured 14 months of trial in the Pacific.

Starting from the coast of Mexico at the end of 2012, he was eventually found in the Marshall Islands in early 2014 and survived in rainwater and turtles.