Swimming prowess and Survival Instincts set in for 32-year-old Fan
by Patti Pietschmann
Fan, a 32-year-old Chinese woman who was on board Royal Caribbean’s 2,000-passenger Jewel of the Seas with her parents survived 38-hours treading water and even falling asleep over night when she slipped and fell off a railing on the 4th deck of the massive ship. Talk about amazing survival instincts. Fan said she avoided being pulled under other big ships by swimming frantically away and that she fell asleep treading water. However she couldn’t avoid jellfish stings and once she was rescued they rushed her to the hospital to attend to those wounds, which remarkably were her only scars from the plunge into the sea.
She was actually saved by a crew from a fishing vessel and brought back to the ship which she and her parents had boarded in Shanghai for what she thought would be a glorious five-day holiday cruise. Fan attributed her swimming prowess to having graduating from a sports college.
During the 38-hours, she was also able to rest by floating on the surface and waving her arms underwater. Her father reportedly tried to check the cruise ship’s surveillance cameras to find out what happened to her, but the footage only showed her walking back and forth. One of the many mysteries of the sea.
However seems falling off ships isn't exactly as rare as one would expect, however this one is unusual because the victim lived.