2023-06-18 05:35:57
Aboard a rowboat, Aaron Carotta left South America in February for a solo trip around the world. A journey that the American adventurer shared on his social networks, until mid-May. On May 31, the 40-year-old triggered a distress beacon. Since then, no one had heard from him.
He was finally rescued on Friday, on his lifeboat, by an oil tanker in the Peaceful, 950 km east of the Marquesas Islands, announced the High Commission of the Republic in French Polynesia. The search to help him had been stopped for several days.
The American adventurer was in electrical damage and his signal had not been picked up afterwards. Five merchant ships and four pleasure craft took part in the search, which ceased on June 12. But on Thursday, the canoe’s distress beacon was again picked up in the area of responsibility of the JRCC (Joint Rescue Coordination Center), which coordinates relief in French Polynesia.
He is expected to land in Honolulu on June 25.
The Smiles, his boat, was overturned by a wave, which triggered the beacon, and Aaron Carotta boarded his lifeboat, specifies the High Commission. The JRCC then took advantage of the presence in Polynesia of a USCG C130 Hercules, an American aircraft specializing in research, which had come for another rescue mission. The same day, this plane spotted the castaway in his canoe in an area devoid of islands and little frequented by ships, east of the Marquesas archipelago.
The nearest boat, the tanker Baker Spirit, was 390 km away. He got confused and found the castaway safe and sound eighteen hours later. The tanker resumed its journey to Hawaii. The castaway should be disembarked in Honolulu on June 25.
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