An Australian sailor rescued with his dog after spending more than two months adrift in the Pacific Ocean has arrived in Mexico, declaring he is grateful to be alive.
Tim Shaddock, 54, originally from Sydney, was picked up with his dog Bella by a tuna vessel after the pair survived for weeks on raw fish and rainwater on their storm-crippled boat.
He arrived on Tuesday local time at the Mexican port of Manzanillo, thin, with a bushy beard and wild hair bunched into a red cap sporting a logo of fishing company Grupomar, whose vessel, the María Delia, had come to his rescue.
‘To the captain and this fishing company that saved my life, I mean, what do you say? I’m just so grateful,’ Mr Shaddock told waiting reporters as he stepped onto dry land.
‘I’m alive … I really didn’t think I’d make it, you know? So thank you, thank you so much.’
Tim Shaddock has finally made it to dry land after he was stranded at sea for two months with his pet dog
The sailor said he was grateful to be alive
Mr Shaddock’s beloved pooch Bella also made it safely to shore
Mr Shaddock and Bella had set off from Mexico’s seaside city of La Paz in April, and planned to sail about 6,000 kilometres before dropping anchor in tropical French Polynesia.
But they soon found themselves stranded after rough seas damaged the vessel, which he described as a French Polynesian traditional boat named ‘Aloha Toa,’ and knocked out its electronics.
In an unlikely rescue reminiscent of the Tom Hanks movie Cast Away, the bedraggled amateur yachtsman was plucked from the water more than two months later by a Mexican tuna trawler, ‘more than 1200 miles from land’ according to Grupomar.
A helicopter had spotted him, tossed him a drink and then sent the Maria Delia to his rescue.
‘I’m feeling all right. A little better than I was,’ Mr Shaddock said, adding his health was ‘pretty bad for a while’.
‘I was pretty hungry,’ he said.
Pictured is Mr Shaddock before he was stranded at sea
The sailor survived on a diet of rain water and raw fish while stranded in the Pacific Ocean
Patiently taking one question after another, smiling and emotional at times, Mr Shaddock said he did a lot of fishing, especially after his provisions ran out.
But he lost his cooking utensils along the way, ‘so it was a lot of tuna sushi’, he joked, as he pointed out how ‘skinny’ he had become.
Mr Shaddock recounted there were ‘many, many, many bad days’ at sea, but also good ones.
‘The fatigue is the hardest part, you’re always fixing something,’ he said.
‘I would try and find the happiness inside myself, and I found that a lot alone at sea. I would go in the water too, and just enjoy being in the water.’
The sailor had nothing but praise for his pooch Bella, whom he had found in Mexico.
‘She just kept following me onto the water,’ he said of adopting the dog after several failed attempts to get her another home.
‘She’s amazing. That dog is something else,’ he laughed. ‘I’m just grateful she’s alive. She is a lot braver than I am.’
Mr Shaddock said his dog Bella had helped him through the terrifying ordeal
Mr Shaddock said he would return to the water but would not go far out to sea
Bella did not join Mr Shaddock for the press conference, having remained on board the Grupomar vessel.
Mr Shaddock said he looked forward to getting home to family and friends and to ‘just take it easy.’
He would ‘probably not’ head out to sea again in the near future, he admitted.
‘I’ll always be in the water,’ he said.
‘I don’t know how far out in the ocean I’ll be.’
For Grupomar boss Antonio Suarez, the rescue was proof that ‘life is beautiful.’
‘We were responsible for saving the life of a human being and the little dog that accompanied him,’ he told reporters.
‘We have medical services on our vessels. He fell into good hands.’
Mr Suarez said the boat that picked up the pair was the oldest in the company’s fleet and the trip that saved Mr Shaddock’s life would likely be its last.
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