Mummified Captain Found Drifting at Sea
The mummified remains of a man missing for seven years have been found adrift at sea off the coast of the Philippines.
The mummified remains of a man last seen seven years ago have been found drifting aboard his yacht 50 miles off the Philippines coast.
The mummified remains of Manfred Fritz Bajorat found drifting at sea aboard his half-submerged yacht.
Express reports that two fisherman recently discovered a yacht partially submerged off the coast of Barobo in the Philippines. When they climbed aboard, they found the grey, mummified remains of the boat’s captain.
He was still sitting at his desk, where he had possibly been using the radio equipment to make a distress call before he died.
Paperwork on board identified the man as Manfred Fritz Bajorat, a German explorer who was last seen in Mallorca, Spain by a fellow sailor in 2009 and last heard from a year prior to this discovery. Authorities speculate the cause of death may have been a heart attack. A broken mast suggests the yacht may have encountered bad weather.
High temperatures, dry ocean winds, and salty air preserved the corpse as the boat drifted around the globe for years.
On the condition of the remains, Jeremy Laurance writes for The Independent:
Pictures show a man with silver hair and a beard, his head leaning towards his crooked arm, which is resting on the table, as if he were studying a chart. His body is remarkably intact. Seated in the cabin, it was protected from scavenging sea birds; and the high temperature, low humidity and salty sea-air appear to have combined to produce ideal conditions for preservation of the corpse.
Had he fallen into the water, it would have been a different story. In tropical seas, decomposition and putrefaction begin quickly and progress rapidly. A body may sink to the bottom initially but the bacterial action which causes it to bloat with gas will normally mean that, after three or four days, it will again float to the surface, where it is exposed to sea-birds, sharks and buffeting by the waves.
In cold water, this process may be slowed. The tissues form a soapy, fatty acid known as “grave wax” that protects the corpse and halts bacterial growth. Bodies have been recovered almost completely intact after several weeks in cold seas. However, a natural mummification such as Bajorat’s is rare, as it requires extreme conditions of cold, salinity, acidity or aridity.
From my 22 years experience as a sailor, I call BS. At sea, normal waves are quite large and would have rocked the hell out of a small, uncontrolled vessel like this. He would NOT have remained seated upright, he would have been thrown to the deck eventually. And the vessel would have gone through stormy weather with significantly larger waves, which would have caused great disarray inside the cabin.
Also, mummification requires dry air, and unless the vessel remained at high latitudes, the air inside the cabin would have been very moist.
How’s it gonna be arid at sea? Even with the salinity, it would still be humid
Here ya go, drama queen … with pictures
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/philippines/12181694/Adventurer-died-of-heart-attack-just-a-week-before-his-mummified-body-was-found-in-yacht.html
Thanks to the person that provided the story. Haters here would have been scribbling on a toilet wall for won’t of something to do.
Keep writing.
?????????
PrinceSERGERaymondMoreau’OfficielSeal
La providence a fait que son corps pourra être
récupérer par les membres de la famille pour des
obsèques normal selon ses convictions religieuses.
It seems to me a sad ending to a man who loved the sea. I admit I do not like the waster so I cannot see any bright spot here.
Bob
he looks like albert fish.
Douglass.. We are still waiting on that movie.
had to believe it was so many years ago and people Are still commenting. interesting how his body is kind of zombiefied and you can see he slid back and forth from wave action. i wander what kept the wind from blowing it aground. i know the currents are circular in the golf . i guess the keel sticks so far into the water that it dominates the wind pressure on the hull. why wasn’t he thrown from his seat? i guess the winds were mild. i wonder if it’s possible to tell when the mast broke…i wonder if he… Read more »
Um… “UPDATE: The Independent article also reports that, though he has not been seen since 2009, the last message received from Bajorat was a year ago.”
How in the hell did a message get sent last year after he wasn’t heard from since 2009?? With this type of mummification he would have had to been dead a few years already. WTH?
Autopsy then showed he’d died of heart attack a week earlier ….
Omg you people need a life off social media lmao!!
What a painful way to go. RIP captain. Just wondering maybe they should just sink the boat and his captain as a final tribute to a captain that died with his crippled ship that became his tombstone. He never left his ship and should stay that way. The high seas should be his grave as a means of last respect in my opinion.
Mummifacapt`n. These writers suck each other’s ol pinions n balls . Don’t tell us that “warm” winds help preserve if a few sentences later your gonna say cold waters slow the process. The pertinent question I wanna know is what kind of sunblock lotion did he use …..spfrip. HA at least 25 % of girls in my highschool class had skin like that thanks to unlimited monthly tanning sessions.
Get real here. Millions of ways one may die but the inescapable truth is we all will and have little control over when and in what manner we go out. So i dont think going out doing something you love should be a horrible way to go. Living to a ripe old age but spending your latter years rotting away in a nursing home having someone changing your diapers for you and nobody coming to visit because they dont want to see that, until u finally die broken, alone and with a shitty diaper on, now thats a horrible way… Read more »
he looks really good for being out there for a wile the salty seas kept him persevered and if someone were to touch him he would fall in to ashes because the way he was persevered.
Goes to show you never abandon your boat until it is beyond hope. Stepping up to leave.
That yacht was still floating after perhaps a full season on the waves left to its own devices
How do you know it was awful? I think he died doing exactly what he loved. Better that than lingering in pain…
A man died Douglas. Try holding your ego in check.
I keep thinking about this story and it is terrifying! imagine being this captain? It is like the story of the Chinese woman who was found in a lift a month after it was decommissioned.
Clive Cussler, your thoughts?
go read the original article on this he last contacted someone on facebook one year ago. rip sir, but this article saying adrift for seven years is nonsense.
And they never found him. Give him a right burial, RIP Captain. That was a horrible way to die
Good idea for movie, assuming they dont get too weird with it.
RIP Captain
This would be a great idea for a movie. Don’t be surprised if you see this show up in one of my projects. VISP Pictures. http://www.DouglasVermeeren.com