Eleven Indonesian fishermen have been rescued from a remote island off Australia’s north-western coast after being stranded for six days without food or water. Nine others are missing and are presumed to have drowned at sea.
The fishermen, who were rescued by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) on Monday evening, were travelling in two boats when they were caught in the path of Cyclone Isa.
In a Wednesday statement, AMSA explained that on April 12 one boat, the Express 1, which was carrying 10 men, ran aground on Bedwell Island, some 300km from mainland Australia. The other, Putri Jaya, sank in the extreme conditions. The only known survivor from Putri Jaya spent 30 hours in the water before being washed up on the same island.
Bedwell Island, according to Al Jazeera, consists of nothing but an exposed and inhospitable stretch of white sand with no source of fresh water.
According to the statement, the surviving fishermen were spotted by the Australian Border Force which was busy conducting a routine aerial surveillance mission. AMSA was notified and sent a helicopter to rescue the fishermen who had hunkered down in a shelter made from boat debris.
The survivors were airlifted to Broome Hospital in the coastal town of Broome. Al Jazeera reports that they are in good health and will be flown back to Indonesia in due course.
[Image: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rowley_Shoals#/media/File:ESC_large_ISS005_ISS005-E-15298.JPG]