Alaskan boy stranded at sea for days held brother and cousins’ bodies after they drowned: family

A 15-year-old Alaska boy survived about 62 hours stranded atop an overturned fishing boat in the frigid Bering Sea, trying to hold onto his brother and cousin after they drowned, his family says.

Derek Parker Aghnaanga was the lone survivor of a three-person fishing trip that ended when the skiff overturned near St. Lawrence Island. His older brother, Sidney Kulowiyi, 35, and cousin Barton Rookok, 34, died after the boat capsized.

The trio left the Alaska Native village of Savoonga on September 4 to fish for halibut. They were expected to return to St. Lawrence Island by about 3 a.m. on September 6, but never arrived.

Video shows Derek kneeling on top of the overturned skiff as waves crash around him. A U.S. Coast Guard HC-130 Hercules aircraft spotted him around 10:30 a.m. on September 7, after Alaska State Troopers notified the Coast Guard the previous night that the group was overdue. However, the Coast Guard-led search was delayed by dense fog.

Derek spent days exposed to the cold and waves without food or water before the Coast Guard called on the Northwest Explorer, a fishing vessel carrying 13 crew members and NOAA scientists, to help rescue him.

“Saturday, all the way to Tuesday, that kid was on top of that skiff. I mean, that’s one tough kid,” Adam White, captain of the Northwest Explorer, told Alaska’s News Source.

The crew eventually reached Derek and pulled him aboard the vessel. White said the teenager was visibly suffering from the cold.

“Through the teeth chattering, he had mentioned that his brother was still under the skiff and then he said that in the previous night before our rescue that his cousin had slipped away off the top of the skiff,” White said.

Derek's aunt, Colleen Walker, described the teenager’s ordeal in a GoFundMe campaign set up to help the family with his funeral expenses.

“My nephew tried to hang onto them as long as he could after they drowned,” Walker wrote.

Acting as a family spokesperson, Darren Toolie-Noongwook, Derek’s older brother, further told Alaska News Source: “In the middle of the night, waves hitting him, he was kneeling and praying. That’s all he was doing was praying. He believed that he was gonna make it. That’s how he got through it.”

The Coast Guard recovered the bodies of Kulowiyi and Rookok and transported them and Aghnaanga to Nome. Derek is now reunited with his family.

The rescue also proved to be an emotional one for the crew, White said.

“When you look into a family member’s eyes ... there’s gratitude, but sorrow at the same time,” White said. “I know I became overwhelmed with it so I had to go hide in my room for a minute.”