José Alvarenga became a real star.
Photo: EAST NEWS.
Ten years ago, the world was shocked by the incredible fate of the Robinson from El Salvador, who survived 13 months adrift on the high seas. José Alvarenga became a real star, his adventures formed the basis of the book “438 Days: An Extraordinary Story of Survival at Sea.” But after the miraculous rescue, the life of the Salvadoran turned out to be far from happy: he was accused of cannibalism, which he vehemently denied. In a new interview with The Sun, former US ambassador to the Marshall Islands Tom Armbruster confirmed the authenticity of Alvarenga’s stories, putting the fate of the current Robinson back in the spotlight.
STRANGER IN THE ATOLL
Fisherman José Alvarenga went on a two-day fishing trip in November 2012, taking along a much less experienced companion, Ezequiel Córdoba. The storm damaged the boat’s equipment and it began to float in the ocean. According to Alvarenga, Córdoba died four months later; he threw the body overboard so he wouldn’t go crazy. But first things first.
In late January 2014, on the Ebola coral atoll in the Pacific Ocean, local residents noticed an almost naked man. The atoll is only 6 square kilometers in area and the population does not exceed 700 people, so the strange giant immediately attracted attention.
Holding a knife in his hands, Alvarenga muttered something in Spanish, a rickety boat lying nearby. Seeing people, the Salvadoran collapsed on the sand and began repeating their name. However, the islanders did not understand “Robinson”: the official language there is English.
A Norwegian anthropology student, who had some knowledge of Italian and was doing an internship on Ebola, helped to cope with the situation. He discovered that the traveller’s name was José, he was 37 years old and in 2012 he set out to sea from the coast of Mexico. He then got caught in a storm and since then he has been sailing endlessly across the ocean in his boat with a broken engine.
But from Ebola to that same coast there were some 10,000 kilometers: many did not believe that the fisherman could survive 13 months under the scorching sun without food or water. Alvarenga replied: he ate fish, turtles and sea birds. All the fishing gear was lost in the storm, so José learned to fish with his hands. He drank rainwater. He hid from the sun in a box intended for fishing.
– After cutting the turtle meat into strips and moistening them with sea water instead of seasoning them, he baked them on the hull of the ship under the rays of the sun. The role of the plate was played by the shell. Turtle meat, rich in fats, vitamins and proteins, was just what the hungry human body needed, they would later write in a book about Joseph’s food.
HE LIVED UNDER ANOTHER NAME
Alvarenga was loaded onto a patrol boat and sent to the Marshall Islands capital, Majuro. Local residents doubted Robinson was telling the truth. Yes, he would be covered in weeds and sunburned, but it would by no means be debilitating. The town doctor examined the traveler and found nothing serious, just partial memory loss.
When the fisherman was allowed to call home, it turned out that he was not from Mexico, where he had sailed, but from El Salvador, and his family had not seen him for a long time. In San Salvador, Alvarenga was waiting for his wife and his 14-year-old daughter, who had never met her father, who had left for work before she was born.
But it was necessary to know the real circumstances of José’s departure from Mexico. In one of the towns in the area it was confirmed that two fishermen disappeared in November 2012. Alvarenga was living there illegally and under another name.
Wait, two? “Robinson” admitted: he was on the boat with his companion Ezequiel Córdoba, who died during the drift. Córdoba experienced panic attacks and suffered hallucinations.
“Ezequiel was in a terrible state, delirious and making impossible demands. He asked me to bring him some oranges,” José explained.
Then Joseph put out to sea.
Photo: EAST NEWS.
TALKING TO A DEAD MAN
“Alvarenga felt like an animal in a cage, shown food, teased, but not given a single piece. And after four weeks of free sailing, the partners forgot all decency, lost the last remnants of modesty,” writes Jonathan Franklin, author of a book about the fatal drift based on Robinson’s stories.
These lines became a source of questions: did Cordoba really die by his own death? According to Jose, his companion even tried to jump into the sea when there were sharks nearby. One morning he died silently.
As the book’s author writes, Alvarenga decided that the best way to come to terms with the loss of a comrade was to simply pretend he had not died.
“During the next day, Alvarenga treated the corpse as a friend with whom he could share his thoughts.
Just six days later, the fisherman, “as if awakening from a dream,” realized he was talking to a dead man. And he threw the body into the ocean.
…and he came back like this 13 months later
Photo: EAST NEWS.
But Ezequiel’s parents did not believe the story: in their opinion, Alvarenga killed and ate their son – that is the only reason he was able to survive. And they took the fisherman to court. Alvarenga had no proof of his words, so he had to retell the story again and again. As a result, he was forced to take a lie detector test, only after that all charges were dropped.
A decade later, former ambassador Armbruster said he met Alvarenga a few hours after his rescue and had no doubts about his veracity since. In his view, Alvarenga was an experienced sailor capable of surviving such a situation. And he did not eat his companion.
