Among those who survived the tsunami are four Indonesian fishermen, swept far away from their homeland by the killer wave. Trapped in the sea with no food or water for almost seven days, their rescue is one of the few miracle stories from this island.On December 26, Jasme, and his friends — Sonata, Mulyadi and Anish — had set sail from Sabang, to catch fish as usual. Caught in the choppy waters, their small-engine boat strayed into Indian territory, drifting into a creek near Campbell Bay, where it rammed into a rock.There was little they could do, except pray and hope for a miracle. Hope came on New Year’s Day, when a Coast Guard helicopter, carrying out an aerial reconnaissance of the southern islands, spotted them.‘‘It was a challenging task as the terrain was rugged and waters menacing. The site where they were trapped was difficult to reach by chopper. Besides, it was around sunset when we first spotted them. Immediately, we sent a rescue boat, which also rammed against the rocky surface. After over half-an-hour, we rescued them and brought them aboard our ship, Vivek,’’ said Ali Muttaher, the captain of the Coast Guard ship which arrived here today.The immediate concern was to provide food and attend to their medical needs. Jasme had a fractured leg, Mulyadi was sun-burnt. ‘‘They would have definitely died. Trapped by an angry sea and left without food and water, there was no way they could have survived. That too when they were so badly injured. It’s a miracle they are still alive,’’ said Muttaher.‘‘The Coast Guard is God. We had no clue we had entered India. Whenever we went fishing we would be warned to stay away from international waters. Had they not spotted us, we would have died,’’ said Jasme, the only one who speaks Hindi — his niece, Subadi, lives in Delhi. ‘‘We were in the sea for nearly seven days.’’Taking out a wet address book from a pocket, he tries to find the phone number of his father who lives in Banache. But most of the numbers have been washed away.Incidentally, Vivek was about 160 miles from Port Blair on December 26, when the quake rocked the ocean bed. ‘‘We were at a depth of about 2,000 m, doing routine patrolling when suddenly there was a deafening sound. I thought we had hit something. The ship was shaking. Two divers went down, only to report that everything was okay,’’ said Muttaher.‘‘It was later that we came to know about the quake. I immediately sent a helicopter to Diglipur to check the damage,” he added.
