Monday night will stay etched in the memory of Vasudeva Naik and six of his fellow fishermen for life. It was the night they spent on a boulder in the middle of a raging sea, unsure if they would make it home at all.
The men, who were on a deep-sea fishing expedition in a trawler boat for nine days, were returning to the coast when they hit a boulder four nautical miles off the Malpe coast here around 7.30 p.m.
When their boat began to sink, they managed to climb a steep 30-ft-high boulder, where they spent more than 10 hours braving strong winds, chilled to their bones.
Jagadish Naik, one of the fishermen, told The Hindu that the boulder was slippery and climbing it was a Herculean task.
“We just wanted to keep alive,” he said from his bed at the District Government Hospital here, where all seven men are recovering.
“We could not carry food or water with us while climbing the boulder,” said Vasu Naik, another fisherman.
The team is thankful to their leader, Vasudeva, who ensured that all six got out of the boat and on to the boulder before he climbed out himself.
Alert through wireless“There was no way I could save the boat as the rod connecting the steering [navigation] wheel got cut,” he said. He managed to alert another boat through wireless, which in turn initiated rescue efforts.
“We spent the night talking and comforting one another,” recalled Pandurang Naik, another fisherman in the group.
Though the local police, the Coastal Security Police and the Coast Guard set out with two boats, the sea was too rough for a rescue, which could be carried out only on Tuesday morning.
The injured fishermen were Vasudeva Naik (27), Vasu Naik (35), Panduranga Naik (29), Jagadish (28) and Manjunath Mogaveera (45) from Bhatkal, Santhosh (30) from Kota, and Subayya Naik (48) from Shiroor.
Pramod Madhwaraj, Minister of State for Fisheries, Youth Empowerment and Sports, visited the fishermen.
