Adrift at Sea for 6 Days, Boys Kept Hope Afloat

CHARLESTON, S.C. — By the middle of last week, the Coast Guard had called off its search, certain that 15-year-old Troy Driscoll and 17-year-old Josh Long were dead.

But they were alive, in their tiny boat, in the middle of the ocean.

Troy couldn't stop asking questions. Dude, he asked Josh, what will you do with me if I die? If I die, will you eat me? Do you think that's Africa in the distance? If we land in Africa, should we become missionaries?

When they had been at sea for two days, Troy wondered aloud if he could cut off his own finger and eat it. When six days had passed, he asked Josh to kill him.

At a news conference Monday, two days after they were rescued by fishermen, the boys described how they had spent 6 1/2 days at sea.

Mostly, they prayed. They sang the four songs they both knew over and over. At night, they curled up together, trembling, to keep warm while waves broke over their 15-foot sailboat. Troy slurped down plankton; Josh ate nothing.

There were a million things to worry about -- sharks, the inky darkness and cold, crashing seas -- but what Troy worried about most was that his best friend would die first and leave him alone with the water.

"I'm a wimp for being alone," Troy said. "I was like, 'Dude, if you leave me, I don't know what I'll do.' "

They described the roar that surrounded them one night when a container ship barreled past 10 feet away, sending their boat flying up a massive swell of water. Josh, who had been dozing on the floor of the boat, looked up and froze: All he could see was the huge dark ship looming over them like a skyscraper. Then the water hit them. But instead of capsizing, they were thrust away by the ship's wake as the vessel passed.

At that point, only God could have saved them, both boys said.

"I asked God to put the strongest of his angels around us," Troy said.

A spokesman for the Coast Guard said authorities had called off the search after three days because they were convinced the boys would have succumbed to hypothermia, dehydration or drowning. He called their survival amazing.

"We search for a missing person as long as it's possible they'll still be alive," said Ryan Doss, a spokesman for the Seventh Coast Guard District. "We honestly didn't think they were alive."