ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Bobbing for days atop a capsized skiff in Alaska’s frigid Bering Sea, a 15-year-old boy held on until he was rescued by a fishing vessel this week, the U.S. Coast Guard said.
The boy’s brother and a cousin died sometime after the small boat flipped, according to the rescuers.
Their bodies were found after the teen was hoisted to safety near St. Lawrence Island — a remote Alaskan island that’s closer to Russia than it is to the United States.
The captain of the fishing boat, “The Northwest Explorer,” said the boy had clung to the skiff for close to three days. “That’s one tough kid,” Adam White told KTUU-TV in Anchorage.
Coast Guard planes and helicopters began searching for the skiff Monday morning after family members reported the three missing the night before. Authorities did not release the names of the three.
