In a miraculous story of survival, a woman from Colombia who had disappeared two years ago was amazingly found to be alive at sea by astonished fishermen. The dramatic video of her remarkable rescue has gone viral on social media.
“Thank God I was alive,” the 46-year old Angelica Gaitan expressed, when she was found Saturday by Roland Visbal after she drifted 1.2 miles off of Puerto Colombia.
As shown in the astounding footage taken by her rescuer, Visbal and his friend named Gustavo are seen piloting their watercraft in the direction of the floating woman, who seemed to be unconscious. According to The Sun, the pair had thought at first that Gaitan was a piece of driftwood until she lifted her hands to ask for help.
In the video the two heroic fishermen attempted to get the worn out woman’s attention by yelling to her in both Spanish and English. However, Gaitan was not able to respond, with other reports saying that she had been suffering from exhaustion and hypothermia, having been out on the sea for at least eight hours.
After some challenges, the duo finally were able to recover the stranded woman from the water with a rope connected to a life preserver they had thrown in her direction. The Sun reports that the first thing Gaitan told them after being rescued was, “I was born again. God did not want me to die.”
As the men tried to get her talking and provide her with some water, Gaitan began to shed tears on camera, seemingly overcome by the horrific ordeal she had just endured.
The valiant fishermen were able to bring the grateful woman to shore, where it is said she was looked after by generous locals before they took her to a medical facility.
As Gaitan was recovering, they discovered her identity along with her painful history, leaving people awestruck. The woman had not had contact with her family for two years, and it is said they had no clue what happened to her until this incident.
She revealed on RCN radio that her harrowing story started 20 years ago when she became involved in an abusive relationship that she claims to have been the victim.
“The abuse began in the first pregnancy. He beat me, he violently abused me,” Gaitan uncovered in the stunning interview. “In my second pregnancy, the abuse continued and I could not get away from him because the girls were small.”
However, even though Gaitan supposedly reported the domestic issues, she says the police took the abuser into custody for just 24 hours, after which he came back home and abused her further, according to The Mirror.
Things escalated in September of 2018 when, Gaitan says, her abuser “broke my face and tried to kill me.” Unable to bear her state of affairs anymore, the overwrought woman disappeared and found herself living in Barranquilla for six months. She told reporters that she tried to find help at a homeless shelter, but when that also fell through she spiraled down into a depression.
“I did not want to continue with my life,” Gaitan stated, and she later resolved to take a bus to the beach where she “decided to jump into the sea.” The woman says she doesn’t remember much more after that since she became unconscious shortly after.
Law enforcement are still looking into the conditions regarding Gaitan’s strange disappearance and rescue.
The local media have since found Gaitan’s daughter, Alejandra Castiblanco, who is working on raising money, along with her sister, to relocate Gaitan to their home in Bogotá.