The U.S. Coast Guard on Tuesday rescued three Cuban nationals who were stranded for more than a month on a deserted island in the Bahamas. The two men and a woman survived by eating snails and rats, a Coast Guard official told a Florida news station.
A Coast Guard surveillance plane saw the shipwrecked during a routine patrol on Monday, the agency said in a statement. “They noticed some unusual flags down there, some different colors, so they noticed a little orange,” Lieutenant Justin Dougherty told WPLG-TV. “They checked it again and noticed that three people were signaling to them.”
Aircraft commander Mike Allert told the station that the trio ate snails and rats to survive and that they installed a large cross in Anguilla Cay, Bahamas. The Coast Guard released an image showing the makeshift shelter used by the shipwrecked.
Coast Guard Lieutenant Riley Beecher
Cubans said they were on the island for 33 days, the Coast Guard said. His boat capsized and they swam to the atoll, Dougherty told WPLG-TV.
The crew of the surveillance aircraft he dropped food, water and a radio to the shipwrecked, the Coast Guard said. Later, a crew of helicopters took them off the island and took them to a hospital in Key West, Florida.
“Our rescue swimmer found that they were tired, dehydrated and showing definite signs of just being out of the elements for the time they were there,” Allert told WPLG-TV. The Coast Guard said they were not injured.
Wednesday morning, the Coast Guard he said on Twitter the U.S. Border Patrol took custody of the Cubans from the hospital and they were transferred to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency in Pompano Beach, Florida.
First Class Coast Guard NCO Nicole Santaretti
It was not immediately clear whether Cubans were lost fishermen or trying to emigrate to another country, Second Class NCO Brandon Murray told the South Florida Sun Sentinel.