http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poon_Lim


Poon Lim
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Poon Lim (b. 1917) is a Chinese sailor who survived 130 days alone in the South Atlantic.

Poon Lim was born on Hainan Island in 1917. In 1942, during World War II, he was working as second steward on the British merchant ship SS Ben Lomond, which was on its way from Cape Town to Dutch Guiana.

On November 23, a German U-boat intercepted and torpedoed the ship. As the ship was sinking, Poon Lim took a life jacket and jumped overboard before the ship's boilers exploded. After approximately two hours in the water, he found an empty life raft and climbed into it.

The raft had several tins of biscuits, a ten-gallon jug of water, some chocolate, a bag of sugar lumps, some flares, two smoke pots and an electric torch.

Poon Lim initially kept himself alive by drinking the water and eating the food on the raft, but later resorted to catching rainwater in a canvas tarp and fishing. He could not swim very well and often tied a rope from the boat to his wrist, in case he fell into the ocean. He took a wire from the electric torch and made it into a fishhook, and used hemp rope as a fishing line. He also dug a nail out of the boards on the wooden raft and bent it into a hook for larger fish. When he captured a fish, he cut it open with a knife he fashioned out of a biscuit tin and dried the fish on a hemp line over the raft. Once after a large storm had spoiled his fish and fouled his water, Lim, barely alive, caught a bird and drank its blood to survive.

On two occasions other vessels passed nearby: first a freighter, then a squad of US Navy patrol planes. Poon contends that the freighter saw him but did not pick him up because he was Chinese. The planes did see him, and one dropped a marker buoy in the water. Unfortunately for Poon, a large storm hit the area at the same time and he was lost again.

At first he counted the days by tying knots in a rope, but later decided that there was no point in counting the days and simply began counting full moons.

On April 5, 1943, Poon Lim reached land and a river inlet. Three Brazilian fishermen rescued him and took him to Belem three days later.

During his ordeal, Poon Lim had lost 20 pounds, but was able to walk unaided upon being rescued. He spent two weeks in a Brazilian hospital, and the British consul arranged for him to return to Britain via Miami and New York. He later found out that only 11 others of the ship's crew of 55 had been rescued.

King George VI bestowed a British Empire Medal on him, and the British Navy incorporated his tale into manuals of survival techniques. After the war, Poon Lim decided to immigrate to the United States, but the quota for Chinese was full. However, because of his fame and the aid of Senator Warren Magnuson, he received a special dispensation and eventually gained citizenship.

Quote: "I hope no one will ever have to break that record".


crazy huh????

 

Crazier is the motivation that caused you to FIND that interesting tidbit of history/Naval lore...

 

LOL yeah you have a good point. 18T, where did you find this?

 

LMAO, LOL.. im not crazy! lol it was on Comcast. I followed a link to a bunch of links and one of the was WIkipidea.

I thought you guys would like to see an example of someones strong will to survive.

Amazing survival story IMO.

 

You are right, it IS truly AMAZING! If I'm ever faced with emminent doom I hop I have enough intestinal fortitude to BUCK UP like our buddy Poon did

 

He had been toughened up by growing up with the name Poon. Just think - if he had been a Chinese ruler he would have been Poon T'ang.

/nevermind that that is pronounced with a 'D' in Chinese. Still too good to pass up.

 

lol i believe in you AWD. the force is strong.

 

Good story, lots of good survival stories from Alaska, not all of them with happy endings... [&:]