Britt Jones
When a man decided to go on a fishing trip, just as he had been doing for years, he couldn’t have known he wouldn’t return for over a year.
The remarkable rescue was 15 months in the making.
José Salvador Alvarenga was a fisherman in Mexico who planned a trip in 2012 with a friend for two days, but it all went wrong within hours.
Alvarenga and his boat partner would end up out at sea for 438 days, and then he would be alone after 3 months out at sea.
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At the time of the incident, Alvarenga had been fishing for sharks, but on that fateful day, the weather wasn’t on his side.
The 33-year-old was joined by Ezequiel Córdoba, who was 22 at the time and the pair set of out in the Pacific Ocean like usual.
Initially, the trip was going well, so when a storm began to set in, they decided to keep fishing and see what else they could catch.
But this would be their downfall.
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The men were quickly overtaken by a storm which didn’t let up for a week, and they realised when it subsided that they had been pushed out to the middle of nowhere.
It turns out waves had flooded the engine and the storm meant the men lost most of the equipment they had on board.
After 10 weeks of surviving on turtles, bird blood and fish they were able to catch, Córdoba caught ill and died on the boat, leaving Alvarenga alone.
He would then go on for a year on his own, with numerous attempts at flagging down skipping containers who ignored his pleas for help.
It was only when he finally found a tiny islet, which turned out to be a remote corner of the Marshall Islands during the 15th month of being out at sea.
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The little island was called Ebon Atoll, around 6,006 miles from Mexico.
When Alvarenga saw this island, he ditched his boat, swam to shore and found a beach house owned by a local couple who were able to wave down help.
It was January 30, 2014, that he was rescued, which saw him with a long beard covering his once shaven face and shaggy hair.
But it’s not the first-time castaways landed on the tiny island as Mexican fishermen were rescued off the Marshall Islands in August 2006, after nine months of drifting across the Pacific Ocean.
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They claimed to have survived on rainwater, seabirds and fish - similar to Alvarenga.
When found, the man’s vitals were said to be good, except his blood pressure which was low.
His ankles were also allegedly swollen, and he had issues with walking.
On February 6, it was reported that the doctor treating him claimed his health had ‘gone downhill’ and he was on an IV drip to treat dehydration.
Since that fateful trip, he was kept in hospital for 11 days before deemed fit enough to do home.
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It has been said that he has developed a fear of water, and he was also diagnosed with anaemia, and had trouble sleeping.
In 2015, he gave interviews about his time on the boat to journalist Jonathan Franklin, who published his story as the book 438 Days: An Extraordinary True Story of Survival at Sea, which led to Alvarenga being sued by Córdoba’s family for allegedly cannibalising him to stay alive.
The fisherman has denied those claims, stating that the pair had a pact not to do so.