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ENTOMBED AT THE bottom of the Atlantic Ocean in an upended tugboat for three days, Harrison Odjegba Okene begged God for a miracle.
The Nigerian cook survived by breathing an ever-dwindling supply of oxygen in an air pocket. A video of Okene’s rescue in May that was posted on the Internet more than six months later has gone viral this week.
(Associated Press/YouTube)
As the temperature dropped to freezing, Okene, dressed only in boxer shorts, recited the last psalm his wife had sent by text message, sometimes called the Prayer for Deliverance: “Oh God, by your name, save me. … The Lord sustains my life.”
To this day, Okene believes his rescue after 72 hours underwater at a depth of 30 metres (about 100 feet) is a sign of divine deliverance. The other 11 seaman aboard the Jascon 4 died.
Harrison Odjegba Okene stretches through the murky waters to reach a rescue diver
Divers sent to the scene were looking only for bodies, according to Tony Walker, project manager for the Dutch company DCN Diving, who were called to the scene because they were working on a neighbouring oil field 120 kilometres away.
The divers had already pulled up four bodies.
So when a hand appeared on the TV screen Walker was monitoring in the rescue boat, showing what the diver in the Jascon saw, everybody assumed it was another corpse.
“The diver acknowledged that he had seen the hand and then, when he went to grab the hand, the hand grabbed him!” Walker said in a telephone interview.
“It was frightening for everybody,” he said.
“For the guy that was trapped because he didn’t know what was happening. It was a shock for the diver while he was down there looking for bodies, and we (in the control room) shot back when the hand grabbed him on the screen.”
On the video, there’s an exclamation of fear and shock from Okene’s rescuer, and then joy as the realization sets in. Okene recalls hearing: “There’s a survivor! He’s alive.”
Walker said Okene couldn’t have lasted much longer.
He was incredibly lucky he was in an air pocket but he would have had a limited time (before) … he wouldn’t be able to breathe anymore.
Okene’s ordeal began around 4.30am on May 26. Always an early riser, he was in the toilet when the tug, one of three towing an oil tanker in Nigeria’s oil-rich Delta waters, gave a sudden lurch and then keeled over.
“I was dazed and everywhere was dark as I was thrown from one end of the small cubicle to another,” Okene said in an exclusive interview after his rescue with Nigeria’s Nation newspaper.
He groped his way out of the toilet and tried to find a vent, propping doors open as he moved on. He discovered some tools and a life vest with two flashlights, which he stuffed into his shorts.
Harrison Odjegba Okene, 2nd left, poses inside a decompression chamber with members of the DCN Diving team who saved his life.
When he found a cabin of the sunken vessel that felt safe, he began the long wait, getting colder and colder as he played back a mental tape of his life - remembering his mother, friends, mostly the woman he'd married five years before with whom he hadn't yet fathered a child.
He worried about his colleagues - 10 Nigerians and the Ukrainian captain including four young cadets from Nigeria's Maritime Academy. They would have locked themselves into their cabins, standard procedure in an area stalked by pirates.
He got really worried when he heard the sound of fish, shark or barracudas he supposed, eating and fighting over something big.
As the waters rose, he made a rack on top of a platform and piled two mattresses on top.
He survived off just one bottle of Coke, all he had to sustain him during the trauma.
Odjegba Okene, 2nd left, poses with members of the DCN Diving team who saved his life.
Okene really thought he was going to die, he told the Nation, when he heard the sound of a boat engine and anchor dropping, but failed to get the attention of rescuers. He figured, given the size of the boat, that it would take a miracle for a diver to locate him. So he waded across the cabin, stripped the wall down to its steel body, then knocked on it with a hammer.
But "I heard them moving away. They were far away from where I was."
By the time he was saved, relatives already had been told the sailors were dead.
Okene kept faith with the psalm he recited, that promises to "give thanks in your name, Lord," at a service at his Redeemed Christian Church of God.
He was rescued by a diver who first used hot water to warm him up, then attached him to an oxygen mask. Once free of the sunken boat, he was put into a decompression chamber and then safely returned to the surface.
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The normal Joe and Bridget is constantly told that they can’t have house parties, they can’t congregate in groups, they must keep social distance, they are a threat to others by not following guidelines and are open to fines if they don’t follow NPHET advice. Then we have this, some country alright.
@Jack Cass: The normal Joe and Bridget are breaking those rules as well.
Just focus on doing the right thing yourself and less worrying about others.
@Fozz: I thought we are all in this together?
@Brian Madden: Yes but being ‘all in this together’ and not curtain twitching are not mutually exclusive.
@Fozz: in fairness the normal Joe and Bridget breaking rules aren’t on a major platform preaching to everyone, day in and day out, about breaking the social distancing and mask guidelines. It’s not about ‘worry less about others and focus on yourself’ that’s the issue. It’s the frustration of one rule for us and seems to be another for a certain cohort of people. Is OK for people to be frustrated. We don’t need to be told every time we see an enraging story like this to `worry about yourself’. The journal never fails to bring out the condescending folk.
Great reason to avoid paying tv license. I’m not funding those pompous overpaid presenters, if we are lucky this will be Tubridy’s final toy show!
Needs to resign, position untenable after that.
And not one of them mean it.
Sorry! Such a meaningless word when it rolls off the tongue.
@Dave Barrett: Sorry they were so stúpid as to be caught out, thats only how sorry they are.
What is it about people like this in the upper echelons of Irish society. how are they this brazen? They are the ones who covered GolfGate. . . . And they do this. How thick and arrogant do the people at that party have to be to accept an invitation to this. Good lord. There’s not a HOPE we’re getting this under control before a vaccine. Arrogant tools.
@JedBartlett: If you get on the Late Late Show or Dancing With The Stars you fall into this category.
It will interesting when they come before the Dail committee to see what questions they will be asked.
Rory Coveney and Miriam O’Callaghan’s positions in RTE are untenable thanks to their links with government.
They are no better than Brian Hayes.
The damage is done
@Ewan O’Doherty: So all should be forgotten after their faux apologies? Remember how outraged everyone was with the pub, Berlin D2. That bar apologised, they should be grand now and the Garda not apposing their licence renewal?
Apologise because they got caught.
They don’t give a toss.
aw give it a rest. they behaved no different than any other workplace. The staff in the school i work in behave in the same manner once the kids are off site
@Bala mc blaha: If other people did it an were caught a simple “Sorry” would not carry any weight with RTE if they were investigating it. RTE have been lecturing the nation on obeying the rules, running condescending adverts on covid since March. They should now pay a heavy price for their rule breaking.
@Bala mc blaha: they are not any other work place. Even consider the high profile people there who had had the virus, they should be more careful than anyone.
@Bala mc blaha: They are not in the public eye big difference when you work in RTÉ
@Bala mc blaha: Thanks for you honesty and letting us all know some of the reasons why schools are not safe.
. In our offices, 2 meters distancing at all times, one way system in and out of building and stairs, only 1 allowed in showers or toilets at a time, segregated desks and no one seated inside 2 meters, staggered canteen times and no one seated inside 2 meters, all stop points have 2 meters signage on floors and all in place and in effect since March. No meetings unless can be held in rooms where 2 meters distancing can be maintained.
@Bala mc blaha: Not in my workplace. Whilst self employed I rent a studio in the local arts center. No outside visitors, one way system, distsncing and entry/exit times strictly enforced. Monthly coffee mornings with other tenants & staff happen over Zoom when they could easily be distanced in the large theatre space.
Not in my wife’s workplace either (a major hospital). Mask on before you walk in and don’t take it off until you’re in your car 13/14 hours later (it’s obviously changed in between multiple times). Distancing strictly enforced outside of patient care settings incl canteen where what can only be described as exam invigilators make sure your mask is not off longer than it should be.
Several teachers have retired from my daughter’s school and it’s very clear from photos/video they adhered to all guidelines.
From my anecdotal experiences it’s not “all workplaces” and RTE are just taking the proverbial.
Why the extra ramifications for the pub, Berlin D2 with their licence being blocked, if a simple, sorry will do. Berlin D2 also apologised, so they should be brand now?
@Alan Wright: *grand
I don’t think anyone really wants an apology from RTE, politicians, the judiciary or anyone else.
All people really want is for the same rules that apply to RTE celebrities for gatherings apply to everyone else.
For the rules that apply to the Gardai and the IRA for funerals, apply across the board.
For the travelling restrictions that apply to migrant workers apply to everyone.
For the rules that allow multi-nationals carry on in business, be also applied to individual Irish entrepreneurs, be they barbers, boutiques, hairdressers, restaurateurs or publicans.
For the rules that allow BLM and Polish abortion protests be permitted without hindrance, apply to all Irish citizens.
You know, the stuff that used to be in the Constitution.
Ah sure it’s grand then, same as Mr. Wolfe.. Be grand sure
How many times have things like this happened in this country, even before March? Same story, high profile wrongdoing happens, scandal errupts, forgotten in 2-3 weeks…
Remember when it was bankers that thought they could just do as they please…
Of course you would not know about the real world in the private sector. In our offices, 2 meters distancing at all times, one way system in and out of building and stairs, only 1 allowed in showers or toilets at a time, segregated desks and no one seated inside 2 meters, staggered canteen times and no one seated inside 2 meters, all stop points have 2 meters signage on floors and all in place and in effect since March. No meetings unless can be held in rooms where 2 meters distancing can be maintained.
We’ve all had losses and needed to restrict ourselves from loved ones. This event had to be planned, someone dosent just up and retire but a copy and paste “im sorry ” makes everything ok. ?? I don’t think so…just screams of being a hypocrite.
Run this by me again, someone or persons unknown in RTE news dept organized a retirement party in the midst of strict contact restrictions , which was attended by household names who have spent months reporting on a pandemic including the daily naming & shaming of members of the public for minor infringements of the regulations, then they all stood around afterwards & posed for group pictures sometimes with arms around one another with masks in their hands?
That’s great but when are they all getting sacked
A lot of pent up hatred and seething dislike for RTE being displayed in the comments above.
RTE wouldn’t be my No 1 institution either but methinks a lot of the above is just using the recent incidents as a cover to vent.
Please stop apologising!
It was an error of judgement…
Yes we would all love an event night out but so be it….
Everyone wants to take the head off people as soon as a mistake is made!. We are getting closer to a vaccine and soon we can all go back to living.
I don’t like to c people being humiliated. If there is any person out there who has never made a mistake in life.. feel free to keep throwing them stones …
Life is not perfect nor should it be!
Despite being the Covid propaganda arm of the State their behaviour demonstrates how much they belive in the hogwash they broadcast every evening to the great unwashed.
Public Service Broadcaster.. Any resignations?… Any questions even?
That took a while
The same RTÉ news anchors went through for a short cut anyone in government who was on when topic of golfgate dinner was on the agenda calling for dismissals and now are very quiet when the proverbial chicken comes home to roost. Glasshouses and people throwing stone And all that
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