Amver's first rescue of the year came when a sailor was plucked from the ocean January 14th after his sailboat was damaged 200 nautical miles east north east of Wake Island.
The sailor, Mr. George Shaver, departed Keehi Lagoon in Honolulu on November 18th headed for Guam in his 29 foot Lancer. He lost his rudder about January 12th in a storm and activated his emergency beacon.
Search and rescue personnel at the Joint Rescue Coordination Center Honolulu received the distress alert and immediately launched a Coast Guard C-130 search aircraft while requesting commercial ships in the area to divert as well. Several merchant ships, including the Amver participating cargo ship Emerald Indah, responded to the request for help.
The Coast Guard aircraft was able to drop survival equipment to Shaver while one of the commercial ships searched for him. Unfortunately the first ship on the scene was unable to locate the sailboat despite several hours of searching. The Coast Guard aircraft was able to relocate Shaver and direct the Emerald Indah to his exact location.
The Captain of the Emerald Indah maneuvered his 77,000 dead weight bulker into position and ordered his crew to prepare for rescue operations. Mr. Shaver was rescued without incident, suffered no injuries, and is aboard the Emerald Indah as it sails to its next port call in Hawaii.
"I didn't think I would make it in the current sea conditions," Mr. Shaver said to the Captain of the Emerald Indah. "I was using the parachute from the survival equipment dropped by the aircraft to try steering towards Midway Island."
The Singapore flagged Emerald Indah enrolled in the Amver system in 1999 and has earned 7 participation awards.
Photo credit: Fotolia
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