Forty-six-year-old Samuel (Sam) Webster, of Island Harbour, is alive today because of his faith in God, his will to survive and his ingenuity to protect himself in the merciless deep 35 miles east of Anguilla. He was thrown from his boat, Try Hard, when his hand mistakenly put the engines at full throttle on Friday afternoon, March 14.

Anxious crowd looking on as Sam’s Boat (centre) was brought in without him

Having made it to the surface and with the odds of survival against him, Sam set about securing himself. He was kept afloat by two buoys fastened under his shirt which he had taken from a fish pot he had found following the mishap. Initially he tied himself to the pot but loosed the rope from around his neck because he was being taken to the bottom of the sea.

Sam on ambulance stretcher after rescue

Adrift to the north-east, he battled for his life all night in the chilly water and for more than half of the next day singing, praying, telling himself there were no sharks around and hoping to be rescued. He watched in dismay as search and rescue craft came some distance away without spotting him until, eventually, the Fisheries Department boat found him.

Sam’s wife Judith and Maclean Webster with life-saving buoys. Extreme left: Trivon who searched all night and day for Sam

Back in Anguilla his disappearance at sea threw the Island Harbour community residents in particular into a tearful panic and people from all across the island joined them in an all-night vigil at the bay and jetty. Several boats eventually set out in search of him and were later accompanied by the Dutch St. Maarten Police Helicopter and Coast Guard including Anguillian-owned aircraft.

Keith Harrigan being taken to ambulance after fainting

By the next day, Saturday, the crowd had swollen enormously, a turnout similar to the size which the organisers of Festival Del Mar are hoping to see there at the event, this weekend, which would have been postponed if Sam had not returned safely. It was a sad spectacle when Sam’s first cousin, Keith Harrigan, who went in search of him, was brought back to shore having fainted when the fishing boat was found but without Sam in it. It was difficult for the hospital ambulance to manoeuvre through the milling throng to take him away. There was a greater crescendo of voices of grief when the Fisheries vessel, accompanied by other boats and the hovering helicopter, later towed Sam’s bright yellow boat to the jetty.

Fisheries vessel towing Sam’s boat to jetty

The dramatic story, with its various rumours, speculation and fears, ended when the Fisheries boat, accompanied by other vessels, returned to search the area, found Sam alive and brought him back. The ecstasy among the waiting crowd was indescribable as he was lifted into the hospital ambulance and whisked away for several days of observation and treatment.

Grieving crowd at the jetty

It was there at the Princess Alexandra Hospital on Monday this week that Sam gave an interview to The Anguillian in which he told of his ordeal at sea.
“Sometimes I go fishing 40 miles east of Anguilla at the top of the deep and 21 miles to the north with the depth of water varying between 20 and 40 fathoms, but on Friday, March 14, I went about 35 miles to the east,” he said. “I left home at about 5.30 that morning, having gassed up the boat the night before.

Sam being taken to ambulance after his rescue

“I went to move down my 68 pots from the east because the tide will soon start to pull so I was trying to get them lower. I had about 60-70 pounds of lobster and about 80 pounds of fish. When I set the last traps I set out for Anguilla at about 4.25 pm and was running the boat very fast as I wanted gas for the next day, Saturday, as the gas station at the wharf closes early on Fridays.

A thankful Sam Webster at the hospital

“When I was about twelve-and-a-half miles coming down, I saw one of my old traps which I had lost last season. When I spun around to check it, instead of pulling back the throttle I pushed it straight to the floor and the boat pitched me out about eight feet away. I only realised I was out of the boat when I came from under the water. I said to myself ‘gosh I am in big trouble’. My shoes and hat were gone.

“The boat, which was then about six feet away, threw some water in my face as it kept spinning around and going further away from me…I said ‘I am going to get drowned. I won’t see Obama become President [of the United States]. I won’t see my children again. I said Ras B will go on Radio saying that I used to play cricket for the island and manage the Anguilla cricket teams – the Under 13s, Under 15s, Under 19s and the Senior Team; and I said Cardigan Connor, my good friend… will read my eulogy without a body.

“I said ‘my mom will die. She really doesn’t want me to fish. She wants me to have a job like the rest of the children. I said ‘my last son, Saqi (7-years old) can’t afford to lose his father…’ so I prayed: ‘Lord if you help me to find a pot to get the buoys from it, I believe I would survive and I would serve you.’

“I swam about a mile-and-a-half and I found a pot and tied the rope around my body. I said that if I drowned at least my body would be found and there would be closure. My mind told me again ‘you can’t give up’ so I took off the two buoys from the pot, put them under my shirt, tied the rope around my neck and stretched my hands out to float. I told myself: ‘Sam, you will not get drowned.’ I also said there are no sharks in the sea and I will be all right. I started singing hymns and felt really relaxed… The pot was carrying me under the water so I loosed the rope and drifted away from it.

“The last time I saw the boat was around 7.00 p.m. I could hear it going round and round. I said ‘boat you and me have been doing this for years and you gone one way and I the next way and I don’t know if I will ever see you again.’ Then I saw a boat about 1,000 feet away from me and it stopped. I learned later that it was Pat’s and Terry’s boat from Island Harbour. Later another boat came above me and stopped. I kept shouting but to no avail. I said ‘someone will find me in the morning. Keith, my first cousin, will find me. He knows where I am.’

“That night passed fast and I prayed that the sun could be really hot because I was cold and it came up hot and red. I heard engines and then saw a fishing boat from St. Martin pass far above me. I also saw Pat’s and Terry’s boat about 700-800 yards away. It was coming straight to me and then eventually turned north…The helicopter kept passing over and over me but high and fast.”

Notwithstanding his difficulties, Sam reasoned that he could possibly remain alive and that by Tuesday, March 18, he might drift down to several other fishermen’s pots, the last being those of Boyston Webster. “I asked: ‘Lord, why I should wait until Tuesday when you can send a boat to pick me up right now,” he recalled. “When I finished praying I heard an engine. When I looked to the east it was the Fisheries Department’s boat. It was going north but it just stopped and put its head in the west. I put up my hand. They didn’t see me. Then I threw up the two buoys in the air and eventually they saw me. I said ‘Lord, thank you for saving my life. You gave me a new life.’ If God was not in the midst of it all, a shark could have eaten me. I could have drowned. If I didn’t find the buoys, I couldn’t survive.”
Sam is a very grateful young man. “First, I would like to thank God,” he stated. Next, everyone who assisted in the search, the Royal Anguilla Police Force, the Dutch Coast Guard, the Anguilla Fisheries Department, the fisherman at Island Harbour. I wish to say a special thank you to Louvan Webster for providing gas for persons to search for me, Kent Webster, the doctors, nurses and other staff at the hospital who treated me well; the media including FM107 and The Anguillian. I also thank all who were praying for my safe return. God answered your prayers.”

Sam went on: “I always told my wife Judith that if anything happens to me any day I go fishing that I would always come back. I love fishing. This incident will not deter me from going back on the sea.”
Judith believed him. Though having her anxious moments, she stayed at home and awaited his return as he promised. Then she rejoiced with others on his safe arrival.
Sam, who is carrying on the fishing career of his late father, Gladstone Webster, served as a Customs Officer for four years after leaving the then Valley Secondary School in 1979. His salary was just over EC$400, a monthly income that paled into insignificance when compared with his more lucrative earnings from fishing.
On the question of having someone accompany him on his fishing trips, he had this to say: “People will say that if I had another person with me they could have pulled back the throttle, but the two of us might have got pitched over and I might have had to be struggling to save that person. It isn’t that I wouldn’t have some one with me, but you need a reliable person and I like to be on the sea all the time. It is my love.”

Asked what advice he would give to other fishermen, he replied: “I would tell them they should be really careful on the sea. It was some carelessness on my part why I fell over. My boat is well-equipped but it was no use to me at the time when I was over board.”

The sea is in Sam’s blood. He will recuperate for some days and off he will go again to resume his fishing expeditions with renewed faith and ever conscious of the need to be careful.

We all wish him well.

- Nat Hodge

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