Radhika
Menon, the first woman captain of the Indian Merchant Navy,
orchestrates rescue of stranded fishermen off the coast of Orissa
By
Shevlin Sebastian
At
noon, on June 22, second officer Manoj Chauhan, of the ship,
'Sampurna Swarajya', noticed a boat two-and-a-half kms away, off the
coast of Gopalpur, Orissa. Owing to a deep depression there were
fierce winds and rains. The wind speed was 60 to 70 knots, while the
waves rose to a height of 25-27 feet. As a result, the boat was being
tossed up and down.
Manoj
informed Radhika Menon, the first woman captain of the Indian
Merchant Navy. “When I looked through my binoculars, they were
waving their shirts and clearly asking for help,” says Radhika, who
is from Kodungallur, Kochi.
She
immediately ordered a rescue operation. “We put out the pilot
ladder, and kept on standby, life jackets and buoys,” says Radhika.
Because of the turbulent sea, it took three attempts before all seven
were rescued.
The
fishermen, who ranged in age from the 15-year old Perla Mahesh to
Narasimha Murthy, 50, were in bad shape. They were weak, starving and
frightened. The food and water had been washed away. They survived by
sucking on ice cubes from the cold storage, which is used for
preserving the fish.
They
were from Kakinada and had set out on the night of June 16.
“Suddenly, the weather turned bad,” says Radhika. “Then the
engine failed. So they decided to anchor the boat. Unfortunately,
they lost the anchor, and were drifting for six days, before we
spotted them.”
At
their homes, their families had given up hope. They were sure the
fishermen has drowned. Tents had been erected outside their homes to
conduct funeral ceremonies. So, it came as a big shock when the
fishermen were able to talk to their families through satellite phone
and convey the good news that they were alive. Eventually, they were
reunited with their families on June 29, when the ship berthed at
Vishakapatnam.
“It
was the humane thing to do,” says Radhika. “They told me that if
we had not spotted them, they would have died. Which is probably
true.”
(Page
1, New Indian Express, Kerala editions)
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