A Facebook post with just a single word has apparently saved the life of 18-year-old boy, drowning at sea near Mevagissey in Cornwall, after his Laser sailing craft capsized.
The teenager has been treading water in the dark at nearly 1.6km from Mevagissey, for more than 2 hours, before he was rescued by the lifeboat crew.
The teenager couldn’t place a 999 call, but managed to post a SOS message – “STRANDED” on his Facebook wall, before the battery drained.
One of his friends, who picked the message up, passed it to the teenager’s mother, who immediately raised the alarm, triggering a rescue operation at night 11pm. The boy was spotted trying to swim back to the shore and was admitted in the Truro’s Royal Cornwall Hospital.
A spokesman for Fowey lifeboat crew said that the rescue operation started with a shoreline search towards Dodman Point from Portmellon. The young man was discovered treading in water without “a buoyancy aid or lifejacket on,” across St Austell Bay, and transferred to “all-weather lifeboat” to take him to the Fowey Lifeboat Station, where the Royal Cornwall Hospital ambulance was waiting to assess him.
Andy Huber, watch manager at Brixham Coastguard claimed the teenager to be “extremely lucky” and advised that people heading out on water should carry a fully charged mobile phone in a waterproof bag, VHF radio, an emergency beacon, and distress flares, adding that these items will help in alerting the coastguard in case of any trouble, which is felt is “a more reliable way” than social media posts.
