Slipped on a fruit peel, swept away by the sea and stuck on a lifebuoy for seven days: it happened to Qin Jianping (40) at the end of May. He survived by eating raw crabs and urinating on himself. “After two or three days at sea the water felt as cold as a refrigerator,” he said.
Source: The Independent, China Daily
Qin Jianping, 40, was taking an evening walk on Haikou beach on May 27 when he slipped on a fruit peel and was swept away by the waves. He did not have his mobile phone with him at the time, so he could not call anyone.
Although Qin could swim, he swallowed large amounts of seawater and suffered lacerations on coral reefs shortly after falling into the water. As he drifted further from shore, he stopped fighting the current and let himself drift with it. Two boats passed him, but did not see the man in the water.
Qin had never swum in the sea before, so he took off his pants, shoes, watch and ring so that he wouldn’t sink under the weight. “The sea cannot be compared to a swimming pool,” Qin told Xinhua news agency. “I couldn’t touch the bottom and the high waves pushed me further and further away. Every time I got a meter closer to the shore, I was pushed back three to four meters.”
After 40 hours without food or sleep, he found a lifeline, but also suffered from hallucinations. In addition, the coast had long disappeared from view. “During the day the sun beat down on me, but the water took away my body heat. After two or three days at sea, the water felt as cold as a refrigerator,” he said.
Urine
During the night, Qin felt so cold that he tried to warm himself by urinating on himself. “Urine was a warm stream,” he said. “I tried to keep that warmth as long as possible.”
On the fifth day he found an orange navigation buoy with a foam base full of small sea crabs. He ate about eighty of them raw. The little crabs were his only food until he was rescued. To quench his thirst, he drank seawater and his own urine.
Seven days after his fall, rescue finally came. Zheng Shizhong and Fu Tingsan were fishing at sea and saw Qin lying down. “My heart skipped a beat when I saw him,” Zheng said. “When we found him, he said he was dying,” Fu said, according to the Chinese newspaper Global Times. “I replied, ‘You’re not going to die. We’re taking you home.’”
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They cleaned his wounds, gave him water, dressed him in dry clothes and brought him back to shore within an hour and a half. His wife, who had come to Hainan to look for him, said she had “already accepted that he was gone.” “I had filled three bottles of seawater to take back with me as a souvenir for his funeral,” she said.
Qin was admitted to Chengmai County Hospital. According to the doctors, he was allowed to go to a regular ward after two days in intensive care. Although Qin was severely dehydrated and had a skin infection, his vital signs were stable.