PNG men survive two months adrift at sea
Updated
After two months lost at sea, seven men from Papua New Guinea have been found by a US-based fishing vessel , the Ocean Encounter. Two of the men died shortly after being rescued near Nauru on Sunday.
The group had set out from PNG's New Ireland province to travel 50 kilometres home to Lihir Island, but ran out of fuel. The 5 survivors were taken to the Marshall Islands for medical treatment.
Presenter: Geraldine Coutts
Speaker: Ben Maughan, captain of the Ocean Encounter in Majuro
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MAUGHAN: Actually they're in fair condition, luckily they're in the hospital right now being attended to.
COUTTS: Now have you managed to speak to them because we know that two have died, do you know what the causes were of their deaths since coming into port?
MAUGHAN: I suspect very advanced stage of malnutrition. The two that died were in very bad condition when we brought them aboard, we had to hand carry them aboard while the other five were able to walk aboard, but very weak, over exposure and like I said malnutrition, they were in very bad condition.
COUTTS: And did they also tell you about the circumstances of the young man that they lost at sea, he apparently was washed overboard?
MAUGHAN: From the testimony that I recorded yes, that's what they said happened and which unfortunately was two days before we rescued them.
COUTTS: Now in that testimony was it described to you how they came to be lost in the first place?
MAUGHAN: They said that they were on their way to Lihir Island from the Tabar Islands, just a small journey apparently and they started running out of gas and apparently at 2pm PNG time, local time, they ran out of gas and drifted the rest of the night and discovered the next morning that they were out further to sea and they had no visual sight of land. And that's when their journey started.
COUTTS: What did you do to help them in the first instance once you found them floating around in the ocean?
MAUGHAN: When we first found them, a helicopter spotted them and we of course immediately changed course and headed for them and I and three other crew members got into one of our work vessels, small vessel and we went alongside to assess exactly what was happening, and I saw that there were several people onboard that just looked very ill and I could see that they had been out to sea for a very long time. So I brought them alongside the Ocean Encounter and we brought them aboard immediately, attended to them medically, checking all their vitals and everything else. And like you said the two that did die were in very, very bad condition. I had the ships' cook spoon feed them just small amounts of water because of their condition and made up a kind of a rice pudding, something soft that their systems would accept.
COUTTS: Now two months is a very long time. You said you went aboard yourself, did you see whether they had the necessary equipment and GPS and all those sorts of things that would have helped them to be relocated way before this?
MAUGHAN: They had absolutely nothing, this was just a small launch, maybe 22 feet long by six feet wide and they had absolutely nothing but an orange tarp covering them.
COUTTS: So they were exposed as well to the conditions?
MAUGHAN: No equipment or anything else, yeah they were exposed, yes.
COUTTS: What did they do to entertain themselves for two months in such a small craft and close quarters?
MAUGHAN: I believe that they probably just tried to survive, probably just catching fish and whatever they could. They didn't have any water. I didn't see any signs of anything that they could do like playing cards or anything else.
COUTTS: Is this the first time that you've been involved in such an encounter, if you pardon the pun?
MAUGHAN: No actually, in my 37 years out to sea I've had a few experiences of rescuing people.
COUTTS: And so what do you think should be done from this point so that this doesn't happen again? Do you think there should be a formal inquiry?
MAUGHAN: Not really, you know this is just a very unfortunate accident, it's just a small little launch that's moving from one island to the other. It would be nice if they did have some kind of small radio or some type of device for signalling. They did tell me that they were spotted by several long-liners in the area in the days that they were drifting and small fishing vessels but they completely ignored their pleas for assistance.
