The Pole drifted in the ocean for 7 months in the company of a cat
On Christmas Day, a Pole was rescued off the coast of Reunion Island (an overseas territory of France), who had been drifting for seven months on a faulty ship in the Indian Ocean in the company of a cat. The couple survived on rainwater, fish and noodle soup.
Source: Daily Mail
On December 25, a small rescue boat was spotted from a yacht near Reunion. The owner of the yacht notified the coast guard, and a ship was sent to the fragile vessel, which towed it to the island. An emaciated 54-year-old man and a cat were found on the boat.
The plans of the rescued traveler named Zbigniew Reket included getting to the South African port of Durban and finding a job there. At the end of May, he sailed to South Africa from the Comoros in an old rescue boat, which he modified himself.
During the trip, the ship's engine suddenly failed, after which the man lost control of the boat. According to him, the current carried him to the shores of Somalia, Maldives, Indonesia, Mauritius. He repeatedly saw the shore, but it was too far away to abandon the boat and start swimming with a cat on his shoulders. And only after seven months of drifting, the ship drifted to the shores of Reunion.
This is not all the misadventures of the Pole. Before the long drift with the cat, he went through a lot of trials. Once Zbigniew received an American green card and moved to the USA, where he lived for about ten years. In 2014, he went to India to buy a large dinghy designed for cruise liners. It was with this that his crazy travels began.
The Pole equipped the boat with a mast, rudder and motor, turning it into a kind of yacht. While he was working, the green card expired. Reket could not return to the United States and decided to sail to Indonesia on his own. On the way, the boat lost its mast, and it was carried in the opposite direction. The rocket crossed the Indian Ocean and reached the Comoros Islands, which are located between Africa and Madagascar.
The Pole spent two years on the Komors. He managed to contact the Polish Embassy in Kenya, but there he was disappointed.
On May 20, 2017, the restless traveler decided to sail to South Africa. He loaded a month's supply of instant Chinese noodles onto the boat, took a cat named Samira, who had become attached to him during two years on the island, and went out to sea again.
During the long months of drifting, Zbigniew and Samira ate rainwater, fish and instant noodles. The traveler had no means of communication. But even seven months in the Indian Ocean in the company of a cat did not break the sailor — he plans to repair the boat on Reunion Island and continue the journey to Poland. But so far, rescuers have sent Reket to the hospital due to severe exhaustion. The fate of the cat is not reported.