NewStats: 3,263,372 , 8,179,935 topics. Date: Thursday, 05 June 2025 at 05:25 PM 1i693k

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — About 100 feet down, on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, divers had already pulled four bodies out of the sunken tugboat. Then a hand appeared on a TV screen monitoring the recovery.
Related Stories

Undersea Miracle: How Man in Sunken Ship Survived 3 Days LiveScience.com
Harrison Okene Rescued From Sunken Ship After 3 Days Trapped Under Sea (VIDEO) Huffington Post

Everyone assumed it was another corpse, and the diver moved toward it.

"But when he went to grab the hand, the hand grabbed him!" Tony Walker, project manager for the Dutch company DCN Diving, said of the rescue in May.

Harrison Odjegba Okene, the tug's Nigerian cook, had survived for three days by breathing an ever-dwindling supply of oxygen in an air pocket. A video of Okene's dramatic rescue —
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArWGILmKCqE — was posted on the Internet more than six months after the rescue and has gone viral this week.

As the temperature dropped to freezing, Okene, dressed only in boxer shorts, recited a psalm his wife had sent him earlier by text message, sometimes called the Prayer for Deliverance. "Oh, God, by your name, save me. ... The Lord sustains my life."

To this day, Okene believes his rescue after 72 hours underwater was the result of divine deliverance. The 11 other seamen aboard the tug Jascon 4 died.
View gallery
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, …
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, Harrison Odjegba Okene looks in awe as a rescue d …

On the video, there was an exclamation of fear and shock from Okene's rescuers, and then joy as the realization set in that this hand belonged to a survivor. "What's that? He's alive! He's alive!" a voice can be heard exclaiming.

"It was frightening for everybody," Walker said of that moment, speaking in a telephone interview Tuesday. "For the guy that was trapped because he didn't know what was happening. It was a shock for the diver while he was down there looking for bodies, and we (in the control room) shot back when the hand grabbed him on the screen."

Walker said Okene couldn't have lasted much longer.

"He was incredibly lucky. He was in an air pocket, but he would have had a limited time (before) ... he wouldn't be able to breathe anymore."

The full video of the rescue was released by DCN Diving after a request from The Associated Press. Initially, a shorter version of the rescue emerged on the Internet. The authenticity of the video was confirmed through conversations with DCN employees in the Netherlands. The video showing Okene was also consistent with additional photos of him on the rescue ship. The AP also ed Okene, who confirmed the events.
View gallery
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, …
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, Harrison Odjegba Okene, 2nd left, poses inside a …

Okene's ordeal began around 4:30 a.m. on May 26. Always an early riser, he was in the toilet when the tug, one of three towing an oil tanker in Nigeria's oil-rich Delta waters, gave a sudden lurch and then keeled over.

"I was dazed and everywhere was dark as I was thrown from one end of the small cubicle to another," Okene said in an interview with Nigeria's Nation newspaper after his rescue.

He groped his way out of the toilet and tried to find a vent, propping doors open as he moved. He discovered some tools and a life vest with two flashlights, which he stuffed into his shorts.

When he found a cabin of the sunken vessel that felt safe, he began the long wait, getting colder and colder as he played back a mental tape of his life — ing his mother, his friends, but mostly his wife of five years, with whom he hadn't yet fathered a child.

He worried about his colleagues — the Ukrainian captain and 10 Nigerians, including four young cadets from Nigeria's Maritime Academy. They would have locked themselves into their cabins, standard procedure in an area stalked by pirates.
View gallery
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, …
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, Harrison Odjegba Okene poses for a portrait insid …

He got really worried when he heard a loud sound in the water outside — sharks or barracuda, he supposed — fighting over something big.

As the waters rose, he made a rack on top of a platform and piled two mattresses on top.

"I started calling on the name of God," Okene told the Nation. "I started reminiscing on the verses I read before I slept. I read the Bible from Psalms 54 to 92. My wife had sent me the verses to read that night when she called me before I went to bed."

He survived on a single bottle of Coke.

Okene really thought he was going to die, he said, when he heard the sound of a boat engine and an anchor dropping, but failed to get the attention of its crew. He figured, given the size of the sunken tugboat, that it would take a miracle for anyone to locate him. So he waded across the cabin, stripped the wall down to its steel body and banged on it with a hammer.
View gallery
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, …
In this image made available Tuesday Dec. 3, 2013, Harrison Odjegba Okene, 2nd left, poses with memb …

But "I heard them moving away. They were far away from where I was," he said.

By the time the divers found him, relatives already had been told there were no survivors.

Using hot water to warm him up, the rescue crew attached Okene to an oxygen mask. He was put into a decompression chamber and then safely returned to the surface.

Before the slow ascent began, a voice on the video could be heard asking Okene to give a thumbs up if he understood what was about to happen. Slowly he raised his hand and stuck out his thumb.

"Good job, my friend. Well done," the voice says. "You are a survivor."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nigerian-man-survives-3-days-bottom-atlantic-232654339.html

Staled news

ViKtor1094: Staled news

front page not nessesarily for breaking news
we can have features news stories pools discussion threads expositories etc.

welldone

Thank God

Wonderful

he try

Wishing the Same Miracle for ASUU strike!!..This one don break Record already!!

the man is very lucky, that out of the number of prayers been sent to God, He still find time to answer his request. God is Ever true, Ever faithful, Ever merciful,Ever loving

Dat one na small tin, the time wey i dey bony for rivers state, my friends for dat area na real fish dem be, dat tym if dem steal dia papa money, na river dem dey go hide for days, wit no oxygen, dey survive up to a year underneath. 31st Dec-1st Jan.

Thanksgiving activated for the guy!

To God be all the glories, who is beyond my God? no one. I am happy for the this great miraclous news.

...while some ignorant ones will say there is no God.

The guy is lucky AF he should be called Jonah for surviving three days under water.

Allahu akbar!!

hmmmmmm the man na mammy water long lost cosuin

Thank God.

lol

Thank God for his life

Wonderful

Wow, just like the movie; 127hours, they shud make a movie out of this too, I.e if nollywood go fit.

philfearon: ..

them go pay you?

iamswizz: Allahu akbar!!

guy u no see where them write psalms
say the guy read psalms.

i pray oooooooooh

Glory be to Jesus I'm touched @ may de souls of his colleague rest in perfect peace amen.

Nice video.... c as the guy dey shine eyes

There is Indeed Power in the Word of God.

kekakuz:
cior

Itunmo?

https://nairaland.unblockandhide.com/1541727/touching-story-only-survivor-boat

I posted it first

wise_many2k: Thanksgiving activated for the guy!

yes na

Survival instinct very strong,not easy to die.

God u are indeed awesome
I love u Lord and may ur name alone b praised