Alive! Teen who spent 49 days adrift in this rickety hut
A TEENAGER survived 49 days adrift at sea in a rickety wooden hut – to end up 1,500 miles from his original location.
Aldi Novel Adilang, 18, survived by cooking fish with wood taken from the hut and by straining seawater through his clothes to reduce the salt in it.
‘I was on the raft for one month and 18 days,’ he said after he was finally rescued. ‘My food ran out after the first week.
‘When it did not rain for days I had to soak my clothes in the sea, then I squeezed and drank the water. I thought I will never meet my parents again, so I just prayed every day.’
Aldi had been working alone on a fishing hut anchored around 77 miles off Indonesia’s Sulawesi Island.
He had been employed since the age of 16 in one of the world’s loneliest jobs – keeping the vessel’s lamps lit to attract fish. The floating fishing trap, known as a rompong, had no engine or sails and was anchored to the seabed with a long rope.
Once a week his employer would come by to drop off food, gas, clean water and fuel. But in July heavy winds made its moorings snap. Drifting without a paddle or engine, he ended up near the Pacific Island of Guam.
He had desperately tried to attract the attention of passing boats by turning on a lamp every time he sighted a ship, but around ten sailed past his tiny vessel without spotting him.
He survived by catching and eating fish. He burned parts of the floating hut to cook what he managed to catch and drank seawater through his clothes.
He was eventually picked up by a Panamanian- flagged ship, MV Arpeggio, which was destined for Japan. However, it was so choppy that cargo ship could not get close and so Aldi had to swim to it. The crew threw a rope ladder to him and pulled him aboard.
Rompongs are a traditional form of trapping fish in Indonesia, but are often unmanned, secured by buoys and ropes.
Local media reported that the owner of the teenager’s rompong had as many as 50 moored in the surrounding waters.
Recalling the moment she was told her son was missing, his mother, Net Kahiking, said: ‘His boss told my husband that he went missing. So, we just surrendered to God and kept praying hard.’
The youngster finally returned home to his family earlier this month, on September 8, to the delight of his parents.
Mrs Kahiking added: ‘ I was shocked when his boss told us he had been rescued. I was so happy. He is now back at home and he will be 19 on September 30 – we’re going to celebrate.’
The teenager’s father, Alfian Adilang, said the family is overjoyed at his return but angry with his employer.
Fajar Firdaus, a diplomat at the Indonesian consul in Osaka in Japan, told local media: ‘Aldi said he had been scared and often cried while adrift. Every time he saw a large ship...he was hopeful, but more than ten had sailed past him. None of them stopped.’
The malnourished teenager eventually changed the frequency on a portable radio and his distress call was picked up the Japanbound vessel on August 31.
‘He was scared and often cried’