Survival Stories: Stranded Adrift in Open Sea | Fight To Survive | FD Survive

The merciless wild, the heartless seas. When nature unleashes her cruelty, could you escape? Could you survive? These are the true stories of outdoorsmen, confronted by death, armed with raw courage and a will to live. They are the ones who beat the odds and return from their own fight to survive. Best friends out for a day's fishing, then disaster. Mayday, mayday, Marine 16, mayday. Come on, bro. You got to get off this thing. It's going down. Plunging into a watery hell. Just intensely cold. They brave two days in frigid waters that should kill them in hours. We need to get somewhere. As body temperatures plummet, they face the ultimate decision. The second day of spring, 2012. Best friends Ed Cohen and Ken Henderson set out for two days of Texas Gulf fishing on Ken's Sport Fisher. Their friendship and will to live will soon be tested by disaster and tragedy. Ed was the best friend you could really ever have. My wife would always call him her other husband, because she's known him for, I guess, about 15 years now, as long as she's known me. It didn't matter if they were hunting, fishing, vacationing, just getting on the motorcycles and taking off. They were just inseparable. We've made hunting trips to South Texas, fished in a spring-fed lake, and caught just tons and tons of large bass, just catch and release, just having a good old time. We've been on ram hunts together. He's a fairly good shot, too. In fact, he killed his ram with a .45 automatic pistol. Today, they've plotted a course to one of their favorite fishing spots, the oil rigs off Matagorda, Texas. Ken's just bought a 30-foot sport fisher. Although the boat's used, Ken's a boat safety instructor, swift water rescue expert, and master diver. So he's made sure the craft is sound and fully equipped. We got everything working right. It had a brand-new Icon marine radio in it, top of the line marine radio, side-scan sonar with GPS. Went ahead and bought some extra safety equipment. I bought an extra five life jackets, besides the seven I already had on board. I had flares, charts, blows, whistles, lights. I had everything in a 50-caliber ammo can that I kept stored in the bow of the boat, waterproof. And of course, if anything ever happened, it would float. Feeling prepared for anything, they set off south at 730 in the morning, heading for the Gulf's oil and gas rigs. We were both like a couple of kids that morning. We were excited, getting ready to go fishing the first time since December had been four months since we'd been able to go fishing because of the weather. I called my wife, Sandy, on the phone. And I told her, I said, look, we're going to head a little farther out. I won't have any cell service out there, but I'll give you a call when I come in this evening. You know, we were in no big hurry. Our big deal was just being out there and hanging around together and talking. We got 70 feet of water, man. This ought to be good. They find a likely spot at a deserted platform and drop their lines. I hope we do like we did last time. Get some bulls out of here. The trees are full. Suddenly, they see something's gone seriously wrong. We were shooting the bull, and he looked in the back. He goes, hey, you think we'll turn them bilge pumps on? I said, what do you mean? I looked back, and I was like, oh my god. For some reason, they're taking on water, and the bilge pumps can't handle the sudden flood. We got to get out of here, brother. All right, let's go. Ken is a former law enforcement officer, and both are Marine veterans. They're used to facing emergency situations, and this is now a dire emergency. Where's this water coming from? I said, we got to go in. And I said, we need to get this boat running, see if we can get some hydraulic action, see if we can get this water vacuumed out of this boat. 100 yards from the rig we were tied to, and one of the motors died. I was like, well, we're going to have to limp in on one engine. I'm fixing to go ahead and put out a Mayday, and we're still moving. Ken's boat is foundering, with hundreds of gallons of seawater in the hull, and more pouring in. Then the second motor dies, leaving them dead in the water. I got on my cell phone. I hit 911. I got no signal, too far out. Picked up the Marine radio, Mayday, Mayday, Marine 16, Mayday. It got no response, because all I was going to do was blurt out our location, and, you know, until a vessel, a distress vessel, going down. Ken Henderson and Ed Cohen are sinking fast. Marine 16, Mayday! An offshore catastrophe leaves fishing buddies Ken Henderson and Ed Cohen scrambling in what would become an epic fight for survival. I said, get the life jackets out. Buckled it one time. I'm still hollering on the radio for help. The boat is listing badly to starboard, and water is rushing over the transom. Ed said, we got to go. We got to get off this thing. It's going down. It's going to roll over. I said, go, go, get in the water. So he jumped in. I was standing on the driver's seat. I let go, and just as I let go, the boat kind of violently popped straight up and threw me off. You all right? The boat just dropped straight down. There was about eight feet of the bow sticking out. We both kind of looked at each other in amazement. We were just like, what just happened? This boat just sunk from underneath us in five minutes. From the first time I looked at my watch until we were in the water was less than five minutes. We didn't have time to react. As soon as that water hits you in the head, you see spots, and it was just intensely cold. Ken's instincts tell him the abandoned wig is their best bet for a safe haven. And I started to swim, and I looked back, and Ed wasn't coming, and I had got about 100 yards from him. And I was like, no, I'm not going if he's not going. The vital emergency gear Ken had so conscientiously packed onto the boat is now trapped inside it and beyond their reach. When it went down, it took everything with it. When the boat turned up, it all floated up inside the cabin. So we didn't have our flares. We didn't have our whistles, our horns, our flashlight. That was everything we needed to get rescued with. Adrift in a hostile sea, Ken and Ed only have life jackets and a half-filled bottle of Diet Cola. The relentless current is sweeping them away from the oil rig. As a master diver trained in survival techniques, Ken straps himself to Ed and puts more life jackets on them for added flotation. And I actually put it over his head and put it on over the top of his other one. I said, is that better? Keeping your head up out of the water. Does that make you feel better? Oh, much better. They are potentially just hours away from unconsciousness and death in the frigid Gulf waters. When they sight a glimmer of hope in the shape of another oil rig in the distance, Ken wants them to swim towards the rig. And he said, no, no, I think we need to save our energy. I said, we need to get somewhere. Hypothermia is gonna kill you and me both. He says, no, somebody will come along, they'll get it. I said, okay, all right, we'll hang tight. It has now been six hours in the water and night is closing in. The men begin to fear for their survival, but there's a source of hope. Ken's wife, Sandy, is a 911 dispatcher. He's confident she'll spring into action. Basically, I got mad eventually because I hadn't heard from him and that was very unusual. I probably stayed up until one o'clock in the morning just waiting on the phone to ring. And it, of course, never did. The frigid March night goes on and the two friends have only the warmth of words. We talked during the night. We talked about a lot of things. We talked about family. We talked about how much we loved each other. We prayed together. We prayed, we kind of put our heads together and we'd pray silently. And I started out asking for rescue. I even prayed for a dolphin to come by and give me a ride to a rig or something. He, all he kept saying was, I just want to get home and kiss my babies. Fatigue and hypothermia are taking their toll, but they find a way to get some warmth and some rest. Turns grabbing each other by our life jackets and pulling each other up on top of us. And then we'd wrap our legs around it and kind of get a little bit, even though there's this much life jackets between us, we could get some, a little bit of radiant body heat and share it a little bit. The only time you could really sleep is when you were on top of the other person. The next morning, you couldn't even work up a spit. It was getting hard to talk. Our jaws were both sore from our teeth chattering and our muscles hurt from just violently shaking from the cold. Without food or fresh water for almost 20 hours, they can only share sips of the diet cola. Now, the sign of advancing hypothermia. Ed begins to hallucinate. I looked over and he pulled out a Bic lighter and said, what are you gonna do? Just light a signal flare or something? I said, no, I'm gonna light this cigarette. He said, I got one dry cigarette. I said, where? He goes, right here in my mouth. I said, brother, you ain't got a cigarette in your mouth. And he reaches up and he kind of, and you can just see the disappointment roll over his face because he was like, man, I'm hallucinating. The two men's torments stretch into the afternoon of the second day. And after 24 hours in the sea, Ken begins to hallucinate too. Ken and Ed are swiftly sinking into delirium, despair and certain death. Marine 16, mayday. 27 hours ago, Ken Henderson and Ed Cohen's sport fishing boat slid beneath the waters of the Texas Gulf. The ocean temperatures are dragging them mercilessly into hypothermia. Then a glimmer of hope. A helicopter passes overhead. It's heading for a gas rig only miles away. I realized that we were drifting by the rig, kind of catty corner. And if we swim across current, we might be able to, you know, let the current slingshot us into the rig. Ken encourages his friend to swim towards the rig, but Ed's body is failing. He was mumbling and shaking and we'd be having a conversation. He closes his eyes and I'd kind of shake him. And he'd, he'd wake up. Well, I'm listening. I'm listening. Ken feels it's urgent that they swim to the rig. Ed, who's now critically hypothermic, doesn't have the strength. Ken unclips the tether that attaches them. I said, Ed, you're going to have to help me here. He says, I can't, I just, I can't, I can't do it anymore. I just can't do it. I can't move. I can't do anything. Ken doesn't want to leave his friend, but he makes the ultimate survival decision. And I said, all right. I said, look, here's, here's the deal. I said, I'm going to have to go for help. I'm going to have to try to make that rig. And, and I wrestled with that decision inside thinking, you know, well, if I miss the rig, we'll both die out here. If I make the rig, then at least I can get Ed some help. He said, I understand. Make sure the first one back on shore gets to kiss them babies for me. And I said, all right, buddy, I'm out of here. I'm going for help. And he goes, all right. I said, I'll see you in a little bit. I will see you in a little bit. I shook him and told him that. Love you, brother. I took off and I started to swim for that rig. And I started to, you know, cry a little bit knowing that this was probably the hardest decision I'd ever made in my life is leaving my best friend of 20 something years alone, not leaving him out there to perish in the ocean, but leaving him alone in the ocean. I swam about 20 yards. I looked over my shoulder and I saw Ed one time rise in the waves. I could see him take his hand and wipe the water out of his face because the waves were still breaking on us and still ice cold. And then when I went about another 20 yards, I stopped and turned around. I couldn't see him anymore. Ken swims as hard as he can, knowing that two lives now ride on him, but he's no match for the current and is swept past the rig and farther into the bone chilling gulf. I finally resolved myself that this was it, that I was just gonna have to float here and hope that somebody would find me and then I could get back and they could find Ed or they could find Ed and they can get to me or whatever. Along with his delirium and dehydration, Ken now has to deal with the pain of self-doubt. Cardinal sin, I left a brother behind and you never do that. I just, I was just so disappointed in my decision-making at that point. Totally depleted by this futile swim, Ken passes out from exhaustion. When Ken awakens from semi-coma, it is night. He's survived 30 hours in gulf waters that should have killed him a day ago. Exhausted and delirious, Ken can barely believe it when he sees a shining light of hope. When I rose up, I saw a lit rig in the distance up there and I guessed it to be about four or five miles away. And I followed up to a star and I said, okay, that star right there. So I started swimming. I stopped for a few minutes when the cramps in my legs and my arms got so bad. And I stopped and prayed. I prayed for the strength. That's all I wanted. I said, Lord, just give me the strength to get Ed help. And I said, you know, I'm not asking for much. I just, give me a foot in the backside to keep going. I don't, I can't give up. I can't quit. Ken's hypothermia has reached a critical stage and time is running out. For seven more hours, he struggles towards the rig, praying for his life and the survival of his best friend. Ken Henderson is desperately swimming towards a gas rig, hoping to save his life and the life of his best friend, Ed Cohen. The seven hour swim has cost him the last of his strength, but finally he reaches the platform. He spots a ladder inside the structure. I actually, I pulled with all my strength and got my legs up on the bottom rung. But when I stood up, it was like, I wouldn't stand enough. It was, it was weird. I just, I couldn't feel my legs very well. He climbs aboard and wanders into the rig's galley. The crew is asleep, but Ken finds food, water and miraculously a telephone. Turned around and looked and there was a cordless phone on a charger. And I was like, I'm hallucinating. There's no cordless phone on an oil rig. I went over and picked it up and got a dial tone and I called my home phone number. Sandy answers. And it's a voice she's been desperate to hear. It was so hoarse that you couldn't hardly understand, you know, anything that he had to say. And he said, I don't have but a minute, but I'm on an oil rig and Ed is still out there. And he was telling me what rig number he was on. Sandy immediately phones the Coast Guard and gives them the platform's number. The Coast Guard fixes the location. Incredibly, Ken is 54 miles from where his boat went down. Ken tries to warm up and prays for good news about Ed. The next morning, he's transported to a Coast Guard station and aids in their search. Well, this is where we have you picked up at. I was pointing at rigs on charts and everything else. And I heard the Marine 16 radio in the background. And I heard that somebody say that the fishermen had found what they believed to be Ed's body floating in the water. Ed's pulse is weak and Ken is rushed to the hospital. But it didn't look good. And I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that, you know, that it was, you know, kind of a shot of hope, but it was a shot of hope. And the lady came out and she said, no, I'm sorry, Mr. Cohen, he didn't survive. And, you know, I kind of wilted. I kind of fell out, really. You know, once I got my thoughts together, I said, take me to him. And she said, are you sure? And I said, yes, I'm positive, take me to him. I uncovered his head and talked to him for a minute and apologized to him that I couldn't, you know, I couldn't get him some help quicker. And then I promised him that I would, you know, do what he asked me to do and take care of the girls the way I've always, he's always told me that he wanted me to. Ed is gone. The doctors now focus on Ken's condition and insist on immediate hospitalization. Probably broke every speed limit between Conroe and Matagorda. Just such a relief to see his face for that first time. So I stayed in the room with him and slept in the bed with him. And, you know, there was a lot of teary moments where he still had a lot going through his mind. Everything that had gone on, it finally hit me. And I knew that I was gonna have to go back and to explain to those three babies and two grandbabies that I took their daddy fishing and didn't bring him home. First one, be sure to get some babies for me. After three days, Ken is released. He knows there is one more thing to do for Ed. And then his phone rings. It was Ashley, the oldest daughter. Uncle Ken, are you home? I said, yes, baby, I'm home. Can we come see you? I said, I wouldn't keep you from it. All three of the girls, they all came over and they were, you know, when they saw me, they, you know, they started, they got upset and they were crying. And I gave them all, we all got in a big circle and I hugged and, you know, and I told them, I said, I'm so sorry. I wish I could have, you know, brought your daddy home. And Ashley's like, you know, daddy was doing what he loved to do with the person he loved to do it with. And he probably wouldn't have had it any other way. And I said, well, y'all line up. And they said, what for? I said, I made a promise to your daddy and I lined all three of them up and gave them all a big kiss. I said, that's from your daddy. And I said, that was the last thing he told me.