Sailors Rescue Fisherman off Aruba

Tillymint, an Oyster 82 yacht taking part in a round the world yacht rally, has been involved in the dramatic rescue of a stranded Caribbean fisherman while sailing to Panama.

The man was rescued from a small open fishing vessel, the Vegas from St.Lucia, which had been drifting for over 20 days without a serviceable engine on the open sea.

In the very early hours on January 26th, approximately 80 nautical miles off the island of Aruba, the on watch sailing crew on Tillymint heard faint cries for help from close by.  They looked, but could see no another vessel. In the time it took the crew to drop sails, turn the yacht around and get back upwind (in 25 knots of wind) to where they heard the cries, the crew of the Vegas had started a small fire to attract the attention of the yacht. The fishermen were in a desperate situation, since despite passing close to other vessels they had been unable to raise a distress call.

Unfortunately, the small fishing boats signal fire got out of control and before Tillymint reached their position, and the crew had to abandon their boat, and jump into the sea to escape the fire. One crewmember was rescued and taken onboard Tillymint. However, in the darkness and weather conditions prevailing at the time, they were unable to locate the remaining three fishermen.

Tillymint conducted a search of the area around the wreckage, joined at first light by other World ARC yachts, and a Coastguard SAR aircraft. The Netherlands Coastguard ship, the Jaguar was also sent to the area to co-ordinate the search.

The survivor, Sherwin John, from St.Lucia was evacuated onto the Jaguar.

Despite the best efforts of the search vessels, MRCC Curacao called off the search on the January 26 , having failed to locate the three missing crew members.