{"id":413929,"date":"2026-07-27T15:34:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T15:34:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/413929\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T15:34:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T15:34:07","slug":"california-man-rescued-alive-after-30-days-stranded-at-sea-with-broken-mast-california","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/413929\/","title":{"rendered":"California man rescued alive after 30 days stranded at sea with broken mast | California"},"content":{"rendered":"

A California<\/a> man was rescued alive drifting in his sailboat off Hawaii after spending 30 days stranded at sea.<\/p>\n

Kai Sato, 39, set sail from California\u2019s Catalina Islands on 7 June hoping to complete his first solo sail across the Pacific Ocean, he told Hawaii News Now<\/a>. But his journeytook a disastrous turn<\/a> when his mast snapped, and the phone he was using for navigation died.<\/p>\n

\u201cI cried for a whole week, just drifting south, like miserable,\u201d Sato said. \u201cI felt like I was going to just try to turn my motor on and just suffocate, to kill myself, I felt hopeless.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sato said he initially tried to motor back to shore, but ran out of gas. \u201cI was literally like a sitting duck, just getting taken south by the current going way off course,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

After several days, Sato said that he began jerry-rigging the sails and used PVC pipes and kayak paddles to try to repair his boat. After about 20 days adrift, he said he ran out of drinking water, and began<\/a> using a plastic bag to create condensation that he could drink.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just licking that to survive\u201d he said, adding that he ate mainly oatmeal and fish and squid that landed on his boat.<\/p>\n

Sato said that it took him a month to reach the shipping lane between California and Hawaii<\/a>, where on Tuesday, his boat was spotted and he was rescued by a crew on a passing containership.<\/p>\n

The Seafarers International Union issued a statement<\/a> last week, in which they said that on 21 July, watch standers onboard the M\/V George III spotted a small sailboat in distress.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll hands were called to assist in the recovery of solo sailor Kaichi Sato aboard his de-masted 32ft sailboat approximately 900 miles from Hawaii,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

The statement said that the crew then \u201chelped prepare the engines for immediate maneuvering\u201d and \u201crigged the ship\u2019s pilot ladder and prepared life rings, messenger lines and life-throwing appliances to assist in the recovery of Sato\u201d.<\/p>\n

Once they were close enough to Sato\u2019s boat, they said that they \u201cshot the line-throwing device across to it\u201d and that \u201cSato pulled the attached messenger line and made fast to his boat\u2019s stern\u201d.<\/p>\n

The seafarers then pulled the sailboat\u2019s \u201cstern to the pilot ladder, and Sato was able to step off and climb aboard the George III\u201d.<\/p>\n

The statement said that in all, the rescue took around an hour and a half, and the union said that Sato \u201cexpressed his thanks and gratitude to the entire crew of the George III for saving his life\u201d.<\/p>\n

According to Hawaii News Now, Sato is now staying with a relative, and is already planning another sail, this time to the Philippines in a larger boat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A California man was rescued alive drifting in his sailboat off Hawaii after spending 30 days stranded at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":413930,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8],"class_list":["post-413929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413929","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=413929"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413929\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/413930"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=413929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=413929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=413929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}