A woman in Brazil has survived spending a week on a boat with her husband’s dead body, fighting vultures and surviving on raw fish.
Maria das Gracas Mota Bernardo, 68, was on her first hunting trip in Rio Negro with her husband, Jose Nelson de Souza Bernardo, when he suffered a heart attack and died at the start of their trip on March 29.
When the boat’s engine fails, Maria is left to find her way to safety for days through a sea of deadly caimans—crocodile-like creatures that can reach 4 feet in length.
Their daughter, Cristian, told reporters: “After dinner, he (Jose) went to lie on the hammock, but the rope snapped and he was stunned. He got up and hit his knee.”
He sat down again and began fanning himself, telling my mother he was feeling hot. He then stood up, screamed and fell to the ground, she said. I grabbed him, raised his head, and he took his last breath.
Maria das Gracas Mota Bernardo (left) pictured with her husband Jose Nelson de Souza Bernardo, who died of a heart attack while on a hunting trip in
They have been planning this trip for months. He wanted her to take a lot of pictures. It was going to be their moment, Christian said of her parents who set off on a fishing trip on March 28
Maria told the family that she had tied the boat to a tree and went to get help in the other boat. Then I found that the engine would not start again.
Christiane said: ‘I went to the bow and started paddling. She spent all those days kayaking.
She said that she was afraid of falling, surrounded by caimans, but also because she could not swim.
On the third day, a man passed by in a rapita, a motorboat. When Maria called for help, the man “kept going,” leaving her stranded, rowing for days on end without proper food.
Christiane said her mother spent the early days eating raw fish and flour that she had eaten on the boat.
She added: One day I drank only water. Another day, she ate nothing but flour with water and drank pure lemonade.
As Maria floated down the river, she banged pots and pans and screamed for help at the top of her lungs.
According to Maria’s daughter, “she screamed and cried, and no one answered her.”
She said Maria decided to move to the other side of the boat and covered the airway with a piece of cloth when her husband’s body began to decompose.
‘She couldn’t sleep anymore,’ Christian stated. All her strength went into bringing his body home, so that the family could give him a dignified burial.
The elderly woman had to defend her husband’s body from the harsh elements of the Amazon, including the scorching sun, tropical storms, and even predators.
‘My mom said the vultures started perching on top of the ship,’ said Christian.
I hit them and they screamed. I took the tarp off the top of the canopy and put it on the body because the bees and mosquitoes were already sitting on his corpse.
After being rescued and receiving medical treatment, Maria is still struggling to come to terms with her ordeal. She was released from the hospital on April 5.
Shaken and weak, Christian said. you can not sleep.
Maria was found by the Navy in Iranduba, just south of Manaus, 100 miles from where the couple set off a week ago.
Maria and Jose, also 68, parted on March 28. They had a fishing boat and a smaller canoe to explore the flooded forests. A search was launched when they failed to reach the house.
Concerned family members alerted the authorities when they discovered the couple’s dinghy tied to a tree.
Rotten fish were found inside and a net still stretched in the water.
On April 4, the Brazilian Navy found the couple’s ship adrift in Iranduba, about 100 miles (161 km) from their point of departure, a week after it had set out.
A Navy helicopter rescued Maria from the scene and officials provided first aid and support to the bereaved woman.
She was then flown to Manaus for medical check-ups.
The Amazonas State Department of Health said Maria is receiving clinical and psychological care at this time.
Meanwhile, the Brazilian Navy has confirmed that an investigation is underway.
