Unable to reach the exit at the front, Luciana and Christophe found themselves trapped in an air pocket in the engine room at the stern (rear) of the boat, which was still sticking out of the water. They didn’t realize where they were until some time later one of the diving instructors, Yusuf al-Faramawa, joined them in the tiny space.
The three of them stayed there for about 35 hours, sitting on fuel tanks.
Outside the boat, Sarah, Hisora, and the others who had jumped off eventually found two life rafts that had been deployed after the sinking. When they climbed aboard, they saw that the captain of the boat and several other crew members were already there.
“There must be some supplies here,” Sarah recalls one of the guests saying. All the people we spoke to recalled a safety briefing mentioning that the life rafts had food and water, but they did not, the BBC reported.
“We found the torch, but again it had no batteries. We didn’t have water or food,” Sarah says. “There were rockets, but they were already used.”
Sarah also talks about the three blankets on board the raft: the captain took one for himself, leaving one for the rest of the crew and one for the guests. “We tore it apart and huddled together,” Sarah says.
The rafts were met by rescue vessels around 11:00 on the morning of November 25, about eight hours after the capsize. Both they and the boat sailed east.
Back aboard the Sea Story, Luciana heard the sound of a rescue helicopter, but her ordeal was far from over.
“We were very happy at that time, but we had to wait another 27 hours,” she says.
Although the boat was found, rescue efforts were slow to reach them. “We had no communication from the outside, nothing. No one tried to see if there was anyone alive,” says Luciana.
She tells me that there were times when darkness and despair overwhelmed her. “I was so ready to die. We didn’t think anyone would come.”
After several hours in the air pocket, the diving guide Youssef wanted to try to swim through the boat, but Luciana and Christophe talked him out of it. “Stay with us because they’re going to come take our bodies, so they’ll find us,” Luciana recalls telling him.
Finally, after being stuck in the Sea Story hull for almost a day and a half, there was a light in the darkness.
A local Egyptian diving instructor, Khattab al-Faramawi, who was Youssef’s uncle, survived the wreck by diving through the underwater corridors in search of people. He first led Youssef out, then, after another hour’s delay due to breathing problems, returned to lead Luciana and her partner to safety. “I hugged him so tight,” says Luciana. “I was very, very happy.”
In total, divers rescued five people from the Sea Story, including a Swiss and a Finn, who survived in another air pocket in their cabin on the lower deck. Four bodies were found.
