The man was rescued by a fishing vessel off the Kamchatka Peninsula on Monday.
The prosecutor’s office did not release the name of the survivor, but the media identified him as 46-year-old Mikhail Pichugin, who went on a boat trip in early August with his 49-year-old brother and 15-year-old nephew to watch whales in the Sea of Okhotsk. The bodies of the dead were found in the boat when the fishing vessel “Angel” rescued Pichugin.
The media reported that the men were carrying a small supply of food and about 20 liters of water in the boat when the boat’s engine broke down.
Pichugin weighed only 50 kilograms when he was rescued. In 67 days at sea, he had lost half his body weight, the media reported.
It is not yet clear how he managed to survive in the Sea of Okhotsk, the coldest sea in East Asia, and how his relatives died. The prosecutor’s office announced that an investigation has been launched into the possible violation of safety regulations that led to the death of people.