A Peruvian fisherman was reunited with the family after surviving 95 days lost at sea in the Pacific Ocean.
According to BBC, the 61-year-old fisherman, Maximo Napa Castro, was miraculously found alive after getting lost in the sea storm in December 2024.
Castro set off on his fishing beat on December 7, 2024, for a two-week fishing trip from the coastal town of Marcona, on the southern Peruvian coast, but after ten days a big sea storm blew his boat off course, leaving him floating with limited water and food supplies.
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The maritime patrols of Peru tried to locate him but did not succeed, but the Ecuadorian patrol vessel Don F found him 1,094 km (680 miles) from the coast after more than three months on Wednesday, March 11, 2025.
After getting rescued after 95 days, Castro told local media in an emotional interview that he survived these long days by drinking rainwater he collected on the boat and eating birds, turtles, cockroaches and insects, but he spent the last 15 days without eating anything.
He said, “I said I didn’t want to die for my mother. I had a granddaughter who is a few months old, I held on to her. Every day I thought of my mother.”
The fisherman’s daughter, Inés Napa Torres, also extended her gratitude towards the Ecuadorian fishermen for saving her dad’s life and wrote in a Facebook post, “Thank you, Ecuadorian brothers, for rescuing my dad Gatón; God bless you.”
His daughter, on March 3, 2025, before the rescue of her father in a post on Facebook, said, “Every day is anguish for the whole family, and I understand my grandmother’s pain because, as a mother, I understand her (…) We never thought we would go through this situation, I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. We will not lose hope, Dad, of finding you.”
Furthermore, Napa Castro received medical checks at the Hospital Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes in Paita, near Peru’s border with Ecuador, and was discharged from the hospital after all the checkups on Saturday, March 15, 2025.
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