Miracle as Nigerian Survives 60 Hours Under the Sea in Capsized Ship After Calling on God
Miracle No Dey Taya Jesus :
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* Tugboat capsized on May 26 while working at oil terminal
* Ship’s cook survives 60 hours in small pocket of air
* Shocked rescue divers find him two days after accident
“The fact this person survived is incredible,’ commented former US Navy Salvage Officer Patrick Keenan. “After spending two days at 30 meters of depth, he had become saturated, meaning his body had absorbed all the pressurized gases and equalized with the surrounding water pressure. Bringing him to surface from that depth, and after having been saturated at 3 or 4 atmospheres, could easily have killed him.
In saturation diving, sat divers are brought to the surface from depth via a pressurized diving bell, which mates up to a pressurized chamber on deck. This allows the “saturated” divers to live and work above and below the surface at a steady pressure state for an indefinite period of time, and most importantly, to be brought to the surface safely.”
Update: Sea Trucks Group didn’t mention how Mr. Harrison was brought to the surface, however Paul McDonald, one of the Dynamic Positioning Officers on board the Dive Support Vessel that was involved with the recovery and rescue mission commented on our Facebook page saying:
“All on board could not believe how cool he was when being rescued. The divers put a diving helmet and harness onto him and he followed the diver to the bell were he was then taken to deck level and kept in the chamber and decompressed for 2 days. It was amazing to be part of this rescue and my sympathy is with the families who lost there love ones.”
“Mr. Harrison has been brought to the surface safely and he continues to respond to treatment,” noted Sea Trucks Group in an emailed statement on 31 May.
Mr. Harrison’s survival will hopefully serve to lessen the grief of the families of the crewmembers who were lost this past weekend.
By Joe Brock
WARRI, Nigeria, June 12 (Reuters) – After two days trapped in freezing cold water and breathing from an air bubble in an upturned tugboat under the ocean, Harrison Okene was sure he was going to die. Then a torch light pierced the darkness.
Ship’s cook Okene, 29, was on board the Jascon-4 tugboat when it capsized on May 26 due to heavy Atlantic ocean swells around 30 km (20 miles) off the coast of Nigeria, while stabilising an oil tanker filling up at a Chevron platform.
Of the 12 people on board, divers recovered 10 dead bodies while a remaining crew member has not been found.
Somehow Okene survived, breathing inside a four foot high bubble of air as it shrunk in the waters slowly rising from the ceiling of the tiny toilet and adjoining bedroom where he sought refuge, until two South African divers eventually rescued him.
“I was there in the water in total darkness just thinking it’s the end. I kept thinking the water was going to fill up the room but it did not,” Okene said, parts of his skin peeling away after days soaking in the salt water.
“I was so hungry but mostly so, so thirsty. The salt water took the skin off my tongue,” he said. Seawater got into his mouth but he had nothing to eat or drink throughout his ordeal.
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At 4:50 a.m. on May 26, Okene says he was in the toilet when he realised the tugboat was beginning to turn over. As water rushed in and the Jascon-4 flipped, he forced open the metal door.
“As I was coming out of the toilet it was pitch black so we were trying to link our way out to the water tidal (exit hatch),” Okene told Reuters in his home town of Warri, a city in Nigeria’s oil-producing Niger Delta.
“Three guys were in front of me and suddenly water rushed in full force. I saw the first one, the second one, the third one just washed away. I knew these guys were dead.”
What he didn’t know was that he would spend the next two and a half days trapped under the sea praying he would be found.
Turning away from his only exit, Okene was swept along a narrow passageway by surging water into another toilet, this time adjoining a ship’s officers cabin, as the overturned boat crashed onto the ocean floor. To his amazement he was still breathing.
FISH FEASTED ON THE DEAD
Okene, wearing only his underpants, survived around a day in the four foot square toilet, holding onto the overturned washbasin to keep his head out of the water.
He built up the courage to open the door and swim into the officer’s bedroom and began pulling off the wall panelling to use as a tiny raft to lift himself out of the freezing water.
He sensed he was not alone in the darkness.
“I was very, very cold and it was black. I couldn’t see anything,” says Okene, staring into the middle distance.
“But I could perceive the dead bodies of my crew were nearby. I could smell them. The fish came in and began eating the bodies. I could hear the sound. It was horror.”
What Okene didn’t know was a team of divers sent by Chevron and the ship’s owners, West African Ventures, were searching for crew members, assumed by now to be dead.
Then in the afternoon of May 28, Okene heard them.
“I heard a sound of a hammer hitting the vessel. Boom, boom, boom. I swam down and found a water dispenser. I pulled the water filter and I hammered the side of the vessel hoping someone would hear me. Then the diver must have heard a sound.”
Divers broke into the ship and Okene saw light from a head torch of someone swimming along the passageway past the room.
“I went into the water and tapped him. I was waving my hands and he was shocked,” Okene said, his relief still visible.
He thought he was at the bottom of the sea, although the company says it was 30 metres below.
The diving team fitted Okene with an oxygen mask, diver’s suit and helmet and he reached the surface at 19:32, more than 60 hours after the ship sank, he says.
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Okene says he spent another 60 hours in a decompression chamber where his body pressure was returned to normal. Had he just been exposed immediately to the outside air he would have died.
The cook describes his extraordinary survival story as a “miracle” but the memories of his time in the watery darkness still haunt him and he is not sure he will return to the sea.
“When I am at home sometimes it feels like the bed I am sleeping in is sinking. I think I’m still in the sea again. I jump up and I scream,” Okene said, shaking his head.
“I don’t know what stopped the water from filling that room. I was calling on God. He did it. It was a miracle.” (Editing by Tim Cocks and Giles Elgood
COMMENTS FROM YOUTUBE !
astrolothot
astrolothot
3 years ago
he also heard fish chomping away at his dead friends and coworkers corpses
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Elyas Pasoon Aand
Elyas Pasoon Aand
2 years ago
Also in a interview he talked about how there were other survivors with perhaps smaller air pockets than him. They would talk until they one by one died
Imagine talking to your friends and each one of them dying slowly and then at the end your alone…
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Ena1122
Ena1122
1 year ago
Not to mention the survivor’s guilt. This can really destroy someone for life. Bless this man
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Voodoo
Voodoo
1 year ago
If I remember his interview, he didn’t think it was more than like 12 hours or something. Crazy.
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Yisus
Yisus
1 year ago
He said he could hear the fish eating his partners’ bodies in the darkness
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Roytwsx3
Roytwsx3
3 years ago
who came here after watching The Infographic Show ?
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174 replies
gammon 1
gammon 1
4 years ago
He’s had it rough on the surface poor guy , at home they accused him of witch craft for surviving and he couldn’t go to his friends funerals due to what people thought .
He’s a survivor and should be given a fresh start and money in the bank .
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4 replies
OP 1000
OP 1000
5 years ago
Jesus, when he grabs his hand, that must have been scary for the diver.
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7 replies
Don Grose
Don Grose
7 years ago
that must’ve scared the shit out of the divers!
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10 replies
Diamond Monique
Diamond Monique
3 years ago
Stumbled across this in 2019
when I was going through A LOT and now all of a sudden NOTHING seems that bad anymore . I’m crying as I type this because wow , he’s a survivor and I know I will be . Thanks YouTube notifications ????????????????????????
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2 replies
Retired Emo Kid
Retired Emo Kid
6 years ago
If I were the man trapped in there I would have cried seeing someone to save me
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9 replies
Amy Buchanan
Amy Buchanan
5 months ago
Amazing rescue. Wonderful job by the rescue team and to this man for staying calm and surviving this terrifying ordeal!!
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JestJuster
JestJuster
9 years ago
when despair turns to hope ……..now thats a survivor
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1 reply
Pi Chan
Pi Chan
7 years ago
He deserved to live more and more years on the earth.
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2 replies
SmashTheMachine
SmashTheMachine
3 years ago
I didn’t realize the boat was sitting on the bottom of the ocean floor!!! I always thought the boat was just upturned on the surface….this is an amazing survival story.
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Natalie????
Natalie????
3 months ago
God that poor man, I can’t imagine what he endured while trapped. He’s definitely a survivor!
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Edgy Teen
Edgy Teen
3 years ago
Man I feel so bad for him when I first saw him. Look at the bruise on his chest. He also looks so cold; only wearing boxers. Thank God he’s fine now 🙂
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GKilowatt
GKilowatt
3 years ago
Thankyou God for the miracle and for those who u used to do this rescue. Prayers and comfort for the families of the loved ones lost.
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1 reply
Flargarbason
Flargarbason
2 years ago
Imagine being on a body recovery mission at the bottom of the ocean and having one of the bodies reach out and grab you.
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Shyla Marie
Shyla Marie
7 years ago
I just keep re watching the moment where they grab his hand… could you imagine… you would have never thought you would have felt another persons hands again, i would have never let go.
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5 replies
outdoornoobie
outdoornoobie
3 years ago
Truly amazing! Three days under the sea…how terrifying. Glad he hung on
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Ash bringer
Ash bringer
3 years ago
Sometimes and only sometimes this is when humanity is worth fighting for…
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Amadeo Moreno
Amadeo Moreno
3 years ago
How can people unlike this video. For real.
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hanna engle
hanna engle
5 months ago
imagine the relief this man must’ve felt ????
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Gunable
Gunable
3 years ago
he survived without a phone? 90% of the world couldn’t do that. congrats to this guy
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emitsomla
emitsomla
4 years ago
Humanity at it’s best. Preservers of life.
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Exorian
Exorian
9 years ago
I’m amazed how the hypothermia didn’t got him o.o Tough man, that one
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2 replies
Rickonami
Rickonami
9 years ago
Some times, there are good news .
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6 replies
Lee Quinn
Lee Quinn
1 year ago
This is one of the absolute best stories I ever heard of.
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Saun67
Saun67
3 years ago
He is extremely brave for putting the gear on and going into the water
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Angel Villalpando
Angel Villalpando
3 years ago
The stuff he thinked of for 60hrs ????man they should make a movie out this dude
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7 replies
Stebanto
Stebanto
9 years ago
Good to see this kind of news, what a legend.
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