Britons shared a life jacket to stay alive
Britons shared a life jacket to stay alive
JAKARTA (JP): Two Britons who survived the sinking of the KPM Gurita ferry off Aceh on Friday recounted how they clung to almost anything that floated to stay alive.
Steve Nicholson and girlfriend Caroline Harrison, both Londoners and 34 years old, were two of the five foreigners aboard the ill-fated ferry who survived the ordeal after spending hours in the sea.
Six other foreigners are believed to have died in the disaster which claimed more than 100 lives. The Gurita sank on Friday night as it was sailing from Kreungraya to Balohan in the Weh Island at the northern tip of Sumatra.
Nicholson told Antara in Banda Aceh that he and his wife were in the water for about 20 hours before they were picked up by a Search and Rescue boat on Saturday afternoon.
They managed to stay afloat by hanging on to whatever they could get their hands on, first a Toyota Landcruiser and then a rubber dinghy before they finally found a life jacket which they shared between the two of them.
Nicholson said the Gurita sank quickly after it listed. The whole thing happened in just over one minute, he said as quoted by the news agency.
When it happened, the couple were on the passengers' lower deck. They jumped into the sea.
He said they were floating without any support for a while.
They swam towards a Toyota Landcruiser, the bonnet of which was visible and to which several other people were also clinging. This did not last long and the vehicle sank. Then they clung to a rubber dinghy which was carrying 15 people. This too did not last long because it deflated. They were lucky to find a life jacket, which the two of them shared.
Nicholson recalled that they were swimming for 10 hours, not knowing where they were going because it was so dark. They eventually gave up because they did not have the strength to go on.
They were picked up on Saturday afternoon, about 20 hours after the ferry sank.
Nicholson told Reuters on separate occasion that he and Harrison had decided to tie the knot while floating in the Malacca Strait.
"I turned to her and said 'You know, when we get home, we'll get married, eh?' And she said: 'Yeah, okay.' That was that. We carried on swimming," Nicholson recalled.
Nicholson said he was a freelance writer who was on his first trip to Indonesia. He and his fiance had chosen Sabang to observe marine life around nearby Rubiah Island.
The British couple yesterday were flown to Jakarta before flying home to London.
Three other foreigners who survived the ordeal were identified as American Margaret Crotty, 23, German Peter Bremmer, 39, and Wong Sun Tai of Taiwan.
Crotty, her feet in bandages, told Reuters on Sunday she swam for about 16 hours after jumping off the sinking ferry.
"Passengers were screaming and shouting. There was panic everywhere when the boat was about to sink," the New Yorker who currently lives in Jakarta, said at a Sabang hospital.
"As I was swimming, I kept bumping into others who had also escaped by jumping into the sea. Some were giving up," she said.
Bremmer, 39, who lost his wife Manuella Helsmit, was still in shock. "We lost everything we had," he said.
The bodies of two foreigners were found. They were 34-year-old Helsmit, and an Irish woman identified only as Margaret, 32. The identities of the other foreigners on board the vessel are presently unknown. (emb)