An Amazing Survival Story

Check out this amazing survival story of two fishermen who survived a disaster on the sea for 25 days.

CANBERRA, Australia (Jan. 20) - Two desperate, dehydrated men found bobbing in an ice box off Australia told authorities they spent 25 days adrift after their fishing boat sank, officials said Tuesday. There was no sign of 18 other crew members.

Authorities were amazed that the men, from the Southeast Asian nation of Myanmar, were spotted by a routine customs service flight that patrols for far larger craft such illegal trawlers and people-smugglers in Australia's northern waters.

Monsoon rains in recent weeks may have prevented the pair from dying of thirst.
The men, 22 and 24, were rescued from the Torres Strait by a helicopter Saturday and flown 57 nautical miles (66 miles) southeast to a hospital on Thursday Island off Queensland state, Maritime Safety Authority spokeswoman Tracey Jiggins said.

A photograph taken from the patrol plane shows both men standing shirtless in their pink ice box — a waist-high container barely larger than a bathtub and often used to store freshly caught fish — and waving frantically.

"These two people being spotted is miraculous in itself in the huge expanse of ocean after drifting for 25 days," Jiggins said.

Authorities have not said what the men ate or drank during their ordeal. Media reports have said they survived on fish chunks that had been stored in the cooler before the boat sank and rain water that pooled on the floor