Two Teens Survive 7 Days Adrift, Eating About 100 Jellyfish and Drinking Rainwater

Surviving the Sea: How Two Teens Endured Seven Days Adrift

On the morning of April 24, 2005, 15-year-old Troy Driscoll and his 17-year-old friend Josh Long left North Charleston, South Carolina, in a 15-foot boat for what they expected to be a routine day of fishing. Minutes after launching, a powerful riptide pulled them away from shore. With no radio and a cell phone left in a truck on the dock, the two boys had no way to call for help.

Attempts to anchor failed when the line would not catch, and their small boat drifted farther out as hours passed. Their worried parents alerted the U.S. Coast Guard by about 10 p.m., launching an extensive search using boats, helicopters and airplanes. After nearly three days with no sign of the teens, the official mission shifted toward recovery, and families feared the worst.

Josh Long: "By dark we couldn't see a thing. The next morning, there was no land in sight. All we could do was pray."

Alone on the boat, Troy and Josh struggled with dehydration, hunger and exposure. They stayed soaking wet and clung together to conserve warmth, which made sleeping difficult. When the sun grew intense they briefly cooled off with dips, but sharks in the area soon ended that option.

Thirst became a constant torment. The ocean looked so clear and blue that they compared it to "blue Gatorade," and Troy begged to drink it. Josh refused, knowing seawater is dangerous. When a light drizzle came, they caught rain with their mouths and licked water off the deck to stay alive.

Hunger pushed them to desperate measures. Troy later said he ate jellyfish to survive: "They're slimy, gushy things, but I ate about 100 of them," and waited to see if they would poison him. Both boys experienced delirium: Josh recalled waking up convinced they were at a store and needed Mountain Dew. Troy at one point begged for an end to the ordeal, and Josh stayed focused on keeping them alive.

Their ordeal ended on Saturday, April 30, 2005, when fishermen Ben Degutis and a companion spotted the small boat about 111 miles from their launch point, roughly seven miles off Cape Fear. Degutis, then 70, recalled that at first he did not know what he was seeing; as they approached they discovered two exhausted teenagers waving and heard the cry, "Thank God!"

After the fishermen rescued them, the teens were taken to a hospital. Medical staff reported that Josh had lost about 30 pounds. Troy required three days of treatment for second-degree burns on his face and feet. Their families described the reunion as overwhelming relief — Troy's father said being reunited felt "like him being born all over again."

Despite the trauma, the teens held on to a small, hopeful plan during recovery: they vowed to celebrate with an enormous ice-cream sundae once they were well. Their story remains a vivid example of survival, the danger of unprepared boating and the thin line between recreation and disaster at sea.