Survivors: 3 amazing survival stories in 2023

Now and then, a story reminds us how resilient the human body is. All three of the following are examples of how people have survived in dangerous environments.

Timothy Shaddock sailed through the Pacific from La Paz, Mexico, trying to reach French Polynesia in April. The Associated Press reported a storm hit his boat, damaging all electronics and leaving him stranded.

The Australian man survived three months in his incapacitated catamaran, Aloha Toa, by eating raw fish and drinking rainwater, he told Australian Nine News television.

A Mexican Tuna boat rescued the 54-year-old adventurer and his dog Bella in the middle of the Ocean, 1,200 miles from the nearest land.

Around the same time, Shaddock started his sailing trip. On May 1, a plane crashed in the Colombian Amazon, leaving only four children as survivors. Three adults, including the pilot and the children's mother, died.

Image: Colombian Army / Handout

The indigenous siblings, aged between 1 and 13, survived 40 days alone in the jungle using what they could gather from the plane, a few supplies the military dropped from airplanes, and their knowledge of the Amazon.

Rescuers from the military and indigenous communities searched for them for weeks, sparking international attention to the operation. The children were taken to the hospital in Bogota (the capital), where they fully recovered.

Even younger than the Colombian children, a newborn became the symbol of hope after the devastating earthquake of February that hit Turkey and northern Syria, killing more than 44,000 people.

The BBC reported that the Syrian baby was rescued from under a collapsed building, still attached by the umbilical cord to her mother, who had died right after giving birth.

The case of the baby became so famous that her family was afraid to lose custody. Despite all the dust in her lungs, she recovered fully and turned six months under the care of her uncles, who named her Afraa, after her mother.