Marín (Pontevedra) (EFE).- One of the three survivors of the Villa de Pitanxo shipwreck, Samuel Kwesi, acknowledged this Monday, almost a year after this maritime tragedy that occurred in Newfoundland (Canada), that he came to accept “that I was going to die.”
Kwesi, a Ghanaian by birth and resident in Marín (Pontevedra) for years, has spoken for the first time about what happened on February 15, 2022 in the act of homage to the sailors who helped him, the crew of the Playa de Menduiña Dos .
There he has recounted what, as he himself has explained, “I have been keeping in my heart for a year.”
Overwhelmed with emotion and unable to hold back tears, the Ghanaian sailor thanked his rescuers for their treatment because “you made me feel good, you protected me and none of you turned your back on me, you were all worried about me.”
“I was saved from Villa de Pitanxo by being able to get out of the boat, but the ones who have given me the opportunity to be here today are these men”, highlighted the survivor, who recalled how, when going up to Playa de Menduíña Dos, “I felt that he was safe.”
Menduíña Dos Beach, the ship that saved them
Before that, according to his own words, “I accepted that I was going to be the next to die”, especially after seeing how one of his companions, who, since he was not wearing a thermal suit, lost his life on the raft while they waited for the Someone will find them in the middle of the sea.
Their “hope”, before the arrival of the Galician ship, was a Portuguese ship that they themselves could see from the raft, “but they did not see us.”
Hours later they heard a whistle behind them, which they blew from Playa de Menduíña Dos, and “that’s when I knew I was not going to die,” he said.
«I did not have the strength to get on the boat. They had to help me”, Kwesi confessed, who pointed out that “I will never forget that effort they made in my life”, leaving aside everything they were doing to help them.
These sailors, he added, “are my family” and he thanked them for all their support “not for having declared in favor of me and my colleagues”, but for having helped them at the worst moment of their lives “and welcoming me immediately as one more of them”.
One year after the Villa de Pitanxo tragedy
Accompanying Samuel in this tribute to the sailors of Playa de Menduíña Dos were his foster parents, Samuel Gago and Ramona Otero, who have recognized that this year has been “very difficult” for him, although “little by little we are focusing it”. .
“He has gone through a very complicated situation,” said Samuel Gago, who maintains that “he becomes strong and fights to move forward,” despite having to deal daily with issues “that take away his morale a lot.”
One year after the tragedy, he recalls the uncertainty they experienced in the first moments after the shipwreck because “we did not know if it was him or not” one of the three survivors, doubts that were not resolved until Samuel himself called them by phone.
Hearing his voice, his foster father acknowledges, “was a tremendous relief in the pain we all felt for those who were left behind.”
Even today Samuel Kwesi “keeps them present at all times,” according to his adoptive family. “He wakes up dreaming of them, thinks about them and even hears his voices,” says his father.
“He takes it very badly but he fights to get out of it because life goes on,” he says.
