Nine months adrift but not reported missing
Three Mexican fishermen who say they spent nine months adrift, surviving on rain water, raw fish and faith, were never officially reported as missing, a top Mexican official said.
Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez told reporters yesterday that he was surprised by reports of the fishermen’s August 9 rescue near the Marshall Islands, 8,800 kilometres from Mexico’s Pacific coast.
“The truth is that it really was a surprise, and it was a surprise for everybody, because there hadn’t been any report that they were missing,” Derbez said. “They are physically well, obviously thin and surely hungry, but fortunately, well.”
Survivor Jesus Vidana said he and companions, Lucio Rendon and Salvador Ordonez, set off on October 28, 2005, from San Blas, a Pacific coast town about 660 kilometres northwest of Mexico City, to fish for sharks, but mechanical problems and adverse winds quickly pushed their boat out to sea.
An employee of the port captain’s office in San Blas confirmed that the men had not been reported missing.
One explanation for the lack of missing persons’ reports is that the men apparently set out in their eight-metre boat on a short fishing expedition with little equipment – just torches and a compass – and may not have formally advised port authorities of their departure.
The men’s relatives could not immediately be reached for comment. However, the government news agency Notimex has quoted relatives of the men in San Blas as saying they had only been missing for three months.
Derbez said Mexican authorities would be on hand to issue them passports so that they can return to Mexico, once they arrive in the Marshall Islands on the Koo’s Fishing boat that found them.
The men said they read the Bible, prayed, drank rain water and ate raw fish during their ordeal.
They have become sort of instant folk heroes in Mexico and the Mexican Council of Bishops even called them an example of faith.
“We should follow the example of these three fishermen, making prayer the source of our strength,” the Roman Catholic bishop’s council said in a statement yesterday.
