PACIFIC PERIL

Cruise Ship Sent to Save Sailor, 74, Stranded at Sea

He was too far from home to get an air rescue.

A cruise ship was diverted from its course to save a sailor stranded hundreds of miles off the coast of Oregon in a dramatic rescue. The 74-year-old man, described as an experienced seafarer, was forced to call the U.S. Coast Guard after his ship was damaged on Tuesday while he was navigating from Hawaii to Canada. It had suffered a broken mast, and its engine had failed after getting caught in severe weather. A coalition of rescuers, including a helicopter and a Royal Caribbean Group-owned Silversea Cruises ship, worked to reach the man, who was stranded 489 miles off the coast and with a shoulder injury. Rescuers then managed to get him off the boat and onto the cruise ship, Silver Whisper, which had been on a 24-night voyage from Papeete, Tahiti, and subsequently took him back to Vancouver. According to Fox News, one passenger posted about the incident afterward, saying, “We were the closest ship to him—it took 7 hours to reach him, with no exact coordinates. A needle in a haystack. Happy to report he was found, is alive— with a broken shoulder, but doing well.”