Is Castaway's Survival at Sea Medically Possible? Harriet Alexander - The Telegraph
go to original February 5, 2014

Filmaker Jack Niedenthal on meeting the 13 month castaway in the Marshall Islands. (BBC Newsnight)

When Jose Salvador Alvarenga washed up on the Marshall Islands last week, claiming to have been at sea for 13 months, jubilation at his survival swiftly turned to doubt.

Why wasn’t he emaciated? How did he manage to avoid sunburn? And would he be in such good shape if, as he claimed, he had set off from Mexico over a year previously?

“Most experts would say it’s surprising, but theoretically possible,” said Surgeon Commander Dennis Freshwater, a survival specialist from the Royal Navy.

... Mr Alvarenga, 37, was photographed landing in Majuro – the capital of the Marshall Islands – looking remarkably healthy.

Some have suggested that his robust frame was down to an edema – accumulation of fluid due to malnutrition, which in effect “inflated” his body.

But this explanation is not wholly convincing, said Dr Freshwater, as the swelling is usually localised, with the face being the last area affected.

Nor, he said, did he appear to bear signs of malnutrition such as a swollen stomach and stick-thin limbs.

“It is difficult because we all have this mental image of someone emerging from sea who is emaciated, covered in sores and totally bedraggled. But from what we’ve seen, he doesn’t look like that,” said Professor Mike Tipton, from the University of Portsmouth’s extreme environment laboratory and author of “Survival at Sea”.

Read the rest at The Telegraph

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