Five men from Nifiloli Island in the Teomutu Province of the Solomon Islands are now here in Port Vila where they are now recovering after spending 24 nights adrift in the ocean till they came ashore on Maewo.
Daily Post spoke to one of the men, Father Joseph Kaveia, who was driving the boat that day they went missing.
Here is the story of their ordeal.
Father Joseph Kaveia, says on the 25th of January in the morning, the weather was fine as the five of them boarded the 7-meter fiberglass boat and set out for Utopua Island to get some local garden food.
He says the trip usually takes 3-4 hours if the boat is light and 5-6 hours if the boat is heavy. That morning the weather was good and the sea was calm and they reached Utopua safely.
On January 26, Father Kaveia says there was a cyclone warning and conditions did not look well so the men spent a week on Utopua till things went back to normal.
On Monday the 1st of February, they set sail for Nifiloli. Father Kaveia says the approximate bearing from Utopua to Nifiloili is 330 degrees magnetic, which is a northwesterly direction.
However, Father Kaveia received advice to set out directly north [360 degrees magnetic]. This he says put them slightly off course as they didn’t see their home island and they ended up between Duff and Reef Island.
Father Kaveia says usually the trip fuel between Utopua and Nifiloli is usually 15 gallons. However, once 15 gallons were used up, they ended up in the wrong place. This was when the men realized they were off course. They carried 21 gallons in total.
The Anglican Father said after they went off course they decided not to use up remaining fuel as he says it would not have been enough to get them to Duff Island though they could see it. He says the plan was to drift and if they got close to any of the islands, they would use the remaining fuel to head to any one of those islands.
They spent the night adrift and on the morning of Tuesday 2 February they could still see Duff Island in the distance, however, plans did not go well and the current had pushed them further away from the island. Later that evening Duff Island disappeared from the horizon as they drifted southwards.
The father of four says they had no life jackets or HF radio on board to call for help. He says they all left their mobile phones back home on Nifiloli Island as the island has Telecom Solomon Islands reception but Utopua does not.
The next day they saw no islands and the wind started to pick up while it rained heavily. They decided to fill the empty fuel drums with seawater and build a make-shift anchor to face the wind. On Thursday 4 February the make-shift anchor broke loose. So the men had no control over where they would drift to.
On Wednesday, February 10, the sea becomes rough again and big waves filled up the boat which started sinking. Once that happened everything went missing except 3 paddles, 3 buckets, and 2 sticks.
The men bailed out until 3 pm that afternoon and managed to keep the boat afloat. Another thing they had onboard which did not go missing was their tent, which they also used to collect incoming seawater and bail the boat out.
On Thursday, February 11, they used the tent as a sail and used the paddle as their steer. Father Kaveia says they decided to dump their engine as it weighed them down and almost sank them when the waves crashed down on them.
As all the kumala was lost the men had no food to eat, for the next few days they just survived on rainwater and prayed every day to God for strength.
Father Kaveia says after leaving everything in God’s hands, they all felt His presence with them as though they did not eat and they were hungry, they felt strong with His presence and the weakness of hunger was never felt by any of them.
On the morning of the 24th of February, Father Kaveia woke up and saw what looked like land on the horizon, since clouds could sometimes fool sailors and make them think it is land. He was not sure whether it was land or just the clouds.
As the sun rose up higher, he woke the other men and they all prayed to God to ask Him to reveal to them whether it was really an island. With the sky a lot clearer, the men were now convinced it was an island and they rowed the boat towards Maewo.
On approaching the island, they were spotted by a villager who helped them ashore and took them to the village where they cared for them for three days.
They were later moved to Port Vila by the Health Authorities and are now waiting for their government to arrange for them to return home.
Father Kaveia thanked God for His mercy in saving them, as the Solomon Islands Police Maritime Wing’s patrol boat had searched for them but never found them.
Father Kaveia says all on board are brothers and first cousins and the 14-year-old boy is the son of one of them. He also says incidents like this in the Solomon Islands are common and usually the lost sailors are found.
He says after this incident, he will never drive a boat again as he is still shaken by what happened. He also believes whoever drives a boat must not be too complacent and always think that every day will be a good day.
Father Kaveia says others must carry their mobile phones onboard so they can call for help when they need it. He says the Solomon Islands though, does not have an emergency number for maritime like Vanuatu’s 114 free line.
The survivors are thankful to the Vanuatu authorities and members of the Solomon Islands community in Port Vila and all others who visited them.
The Temotu province is Solomon Island’s easternmost province which borders with us.
To add to the remoteness, Nifiloli Island does not have an airport and the closest airport is on Nendo Island, which Father Kevia says is an hour’s boat trip south. In terms of coastal shipping, he says they get up to three ships in a month from the nation’s capital Honiara.
By Charles Hakwa
Vanuatu Daily Post
