Capsized Boat Survivors Clung to Hope and a Cooler

May 22, 2010 — -- It is an amazing tale of survival and courage, but also a tale of mistakes that almost cost three boaters their lives. It is also a will to live that may have been what saved them.

John Nevarez, one of the survivors, said, "Because of the fact that we never gave up, we're here."

Speaking publicly for the first time since their rescue off the coast of Florida, Nevarez recounted the harrowing tale of how he, younger brother Elias and friend Rebecca Sullivan spent three days adrift in the ocean after their fishing boat capsized after two huge waves struck their boat last Sunday.

"The first wave came over the back end and filled the boat up considerably with water. The waves that hit us, the first one was in the upper six foot to seven foot [range]," he said. "It looked huge."

He said, "The boat capsized in eight seconds."

Their radio was knocked out, and there was no time to grab their life preservers. For the next 10 hours, they clung to the overturned boat.

"At that point, I looked at each one of them and I told them if you have any fears get rid of them now," he said. "There was no fear, there was truly no fear. We knew we were all going to survive."

They did manage to salvage two coolers. They had water to drink and some squid -- their fish bait -- to eat. On two occassions they saw Coast Guard searchers in the distance, but the would-be rescuers didn't see them.

Nevarez, a navy veteran, imposed a militarylike regimen: someone always kept watch, while the other two rested. Food and water were carefully rationed.

"We checked on each other every minute to the point where it was almost annoying," Nevarez said.

They passed the long hours talking about their families and sharing favorite lines from movies.

"We talked about movie quotes, each other's families," Nevarez said. "[Rebecca's] little daughter, my daughter, Erica, his wife, our famlies, anything we could think of."

The next day, Monday, the three spotted what looked like an oil rig in the distance and decided to head toward it, using the larger cooler as a flotation device. They never made it.