You know, amazing stories about people who’ve survived a plane crash are also extremely
rare.
But what if I tell you that one man not only stayed alive after his plane dropped into
the ocean, but also managed to fend off hungry sharks for a whopping 15 hours until he was
rescued?
Doesn’t sound like much fun now, does it?.
It happened in 1986, and this man's name was Walter Wyatt, Jr.
The thirty-seven-year-old flight engineer was flying from Nassau, the capital of the
Bahamas, to Miami on a rainy December day.
He was the only person on board his twin-engine Beechcraft.
However, it wasn't a peaceful flight: in Nassau, Wyatt had his navigational equipment stolen,
and now he had to rely on a hand-held radio and a simple compass.
The plane had already traveled over Andros Island when the sky darkened ominously, and
the compass needle started to gyrate wildly.
Not to go off the course, the pilot tried to locate some landmark to guide him.
At one moment, he noticed a chain of rocks which he believed led to Bimini, the westernmost
region of the Bahamas.
But as he lay a course to the north, following the rocks, he realized two things.
First, Bimini wasn't about to appear from the raging waves.
And second, he was absolutely, terrifyingly lost.
Trying to keep calm, Wyatt switched on his radio and sent a Mayday distress call.
Almost immediately, he received an answer from an Air Jamaica Miami-bound flight which
then relayed his shout for help to the Coast Guard.
But after that, things got a bit messed up.
Although a Falcon search jet responded to Wyatt's signal straight away, the violent
thunderstorm and another distress call caused confusion.
As a result, it took the rescue plane almost an hour to reach Wyatt's Beechcraft.
That's why, by the time the white-and-orange Coast Guard jet appeared, night had already
fallen, and the right engine of Wyatt's plane had started to sputter.
The Falcon's commander tried to encourage Wyatt by saying there was an emergency landing
strip nearby.
Just 6 miles, he said, and they would be there.
Relieved, the Beechcraft's pilot followed the Falcon.
Little did he know that his luck was running out.
All of a sudden, his plane's right engine coughed and died.
Right after that, the left fuel tank ran empty, and with horror, Wyatt realized that both
engines had collapsed.
Everything happened lightning fast.
Almost instantly, the airplane lost altitude and started its dizzying descent.
Wyatt shouted he was going down, and the Falcon's pilot could only watch in shocked silence
while the other plane hit the sea and disappeared among the waves.
Circling over the place of the crash, he desperately tried to locate the plane, but there was neither
machine nor man to be seen.
Several circles later, and there was still no life raft, no flares, and no emergency
transmissions.
It could mean only one thing: Wyatt hadn't survived.
Still, the crew of the Falcon wanted to keep searching, but the fuel gauge showed that
their tank was alarmingly close to empty.
At 6 PM, there was nothing to do but turn the plane and head for Key West.
No-one on board could believe the tragedy they’d just witnessed; they were planning
to fuel up and return to continue the search.
But what really happened when Wyatt's plane dropped from the sky?
As soon as the machine touched the water’s surface, the pilot's forehead hit the instrumental
panel, almost knocking him out.
Luckily, he didn't lose consciousness and was still able to control the situation.
He felt the airplane bounce and slam back into the water.
Grabbing two flares, Wyatt climbed out onto the wing and inflated his life vest.
He felt relieved when he saw the approaching lights of the rescue jet.
He rushed to ignite a flare... and nothing!
It fizzled and died.
The second flare simply crumpled in his hands.
The situation was becoming more and more hopeless.
The wing, where the man was standing, suddenly gave way under his feet.
Within seconds, the plane was gone, with Wyatt left adrift in the rough sea.
Luckily, the pilot had previously taken a sea-survival course and knew how important
it was to conserve energy.
But despite his attempts, just half an hour later, he was already shaking and suffering
from leg cramps.
But the worst thing was that he was getting desperate.
He knew that in the darkness, with the weather so stormy, and the waves raging around, nobody
would be able to spot him in the water.
That's why he decided to swim in the direction of another Bahamas island, Cay Sal (or at
least, in the direction where he thought Cay Sal was).
Unfortunately, in less than an hour, due to violent waves, powerful gusts of wind, and
the rough sea, the man was completely disoriented.
But what worried him most was his life vest's left chamber: it was softening since the air
was leaving through a hole next to the inflation tube.
In no time, the tube got detached from the vest, and the chamber literally collapsed.
In a futile attempt to inflate it again, Wyatt blew into the hole left in the place where
the tube used to be and sealed it with his finger.
On top of that, when the pilot hit his forehead against the instrumental panel, it left a
gashing wound which was now oozing blood.
The pain wasn't the worst thing about that.
The most terrifying consequence of his injury was that the metallic scent of blood started
to attract sharks hunting in that area.
Wyatt wasn't planning to give up.
First, he took off his airline ID badge from his neck and used his watchband to scratch
his last will on it.
"Trish - house."
He hoped they would realize that he wanted to leave his house to his girlfriend, Trisha.
Also, he scratched a coded message for the rest of his family: his Mom and Dad, his son
Walter and daughter Jennifer.
"143 MDJWT," the etching read, which meant "I love you."
After he securely tied the badge to his vest, he glanced at his watch: 8 PM.
And then, out of the blue, he felt something massive bumping into his leg.
Sharks had arrived to have their feast.
The man was a pace away from a full-fledged panic attack.
The shark seemed to have left, but Wyatt knew: once they’d smelled their prey, they would
be back.
Besides, the right chamber of his vest had started to leak before its inflation tube
broke loose as well.
Once again, the pilot blew some air into the hole and used another finger to prevent what
little air was left inside from leaking out.
He struggled to keep his head above the water surface and tried to catch some rainwater
with his dry mouth.
Meanwhile, the crew of the Falcon, which had replenished its fuel supply in Key West, was
flying back toward the spot where they’d last seen the Beechcraft.
The rescue jet was being followed by a Navy helicopter whose task was to spotlight the
sea below.
Regrettably, the storm wasn't going to calm down, and visibility had fallen to almost
zero.
It was too dangerous for the people on board, so the order came to return to the base.
The search was put off till the morning.
Far down in the water, the exhausted pilot felt another blow on the leg.
He kicked at it and, panicking, pulled his fingers out of the holes in the vest.
Water started to fill it, and for one horrifying moment, the man went underwater.
He pulled and tugged until he was free from the vest and managed to get back to the surface
to gulp some air.
It took him almost an hour to calm down.
When he felt he could think logically, Wyatt filled the vest's chambers with more air and
rested his body on top of it.
He didn't know how much time he spent rocking on the waves but, eventually, the sky got
lighter.
But just as the pilot started to feel some hope, he saw a nightmarish view - a dorsal
fin just a couple of feet away.
Then one more, and another one!
The man realized that the sharks returned in a pack, and they were closing on him.
When the first shark dived and headed toward his legs, Wyatt managed to slam his heel forcefully
between its eyes.
This spooked the predator, and it rushed away.
Still, it didn't leave the man alone, circling nearby.
When two other sharks dashed toward Wyatt, he gave several frantic kicks and managed
to fend off those beasts as well.
And that's how it went: a shark would charge at him, and he would gather all his strength
to scare it away.
At the same time, Wyatt understood that sooner or later, he would miss an attack, and that
would be the end of him.
When Wyatt saw the clouds part and a bright star heading down toward him, he decided that
he’d finally lost his mind.
But several moments later he realized that it was a Coast Guard aircraft, and it was
circling, searching for him!
When the plane got closer, Wyatt started to wave his bright-orange life vest to attract
the pilot's attention.
For one panic-stricken moment, he thought that they hadn't noticed him.
But he was wrong.
Up there, in the cockpit, the captain of the aircraft was already radioing the Coast Guard
ship, which was just 12 minutes away from there.
Immediately, the cutter sped to the rescue.
And that's when the Falcon's pilot saw massive dark shadows circling Wyatt.
He frantically radioed the cutter, urging it to move as fast as possible.
At first, Wyatt didn’t understand why the plane hadn't dropped a life raft for him,
but in a minute, he got the answer.
A sleek boat rushed through the waves, and soon the man was already hanging onto its
bottom rung.
Two men had to help him up since he had no strength left in his body.
It was 9 AM, and at the moment he was rescued, he’d been bobbing on the waves for around
15 hours.
Wow.
Do you know any other miraculous survival stories?
Let me know down in the comments!
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