After 20-day ordeal, fishermen return home
Six missing fishermen reach Vijayawada
By : DC Correspondent
Update: 2015-07-07 06:10 GMT
Vijayawada: The six-member missing fishermen team reached the city after 20 days and are on their way to their native places with help of officials of fisheries department.
The six-member team of K. Venkateswarlu, K. Chitti Babu, K. Jaalaiah from Nellore district Katamgari Jalaiah from Prakasam district and T. Nagaraju and Saikam Nagur of Machilipatnam reached the city by Coromandal express on Monday morning.
The fishermen expressed happiness believing it was a rebirth for them. Sharing the experiences with media, they said the coast guards identified them in West Bengal limits. Nagur said they first saw an aircraft and signalled to it.
Soon, a coast guard ship reached them and helped them come back to shore. Speaking to this newspaper they said that they have had fish and ice water from the sea for the last 20 days.
Naga Raju said that they had no idea where they were in the sea.
“Actually we carried rice, vegetables, gas stove and ice boxes. However, all the items were enough only for a week, after which we ate fish roasted on the stove. We used water from the ice box for drinking,” he added.
District collector A. Babu said that the government monitored with coast guards and alerted the officials along the coastline. They were overwhelmed with joy and tears upon being reunited with their families, something they had never thought would be possible.