A 15-year-old boy from Savoonga, Alaska, was found alive after spending days clinging to his family's capsized fishing boat as it drifted through the freezing Bering Sea towards the Russian border, in a rescue that turned to tragedy when his brother and cousin were found dead. Derek Parker Aghnaanga had been out fishing for halibut with his 35-year-old brother, Sidney Kulowiyi, and 34-year-old cousin, Barton Rookok, when their small boat capsized last Saturday night far from shore. The case highlights the perilous conditions faced by small fishing crews in remote Alaskan waters and the scale of the search effort required to find survivors.

Kulowiyi, the boat's captain, became trapped beneath the vessel and drowned immediately, while Rookok clung to the hull alongside the teenager for around a day before he too drowned, leaving Aghnaanga alone on the overturned skiff without food or water. After the trio failed to return as expected, Alaska State Troopers alerted the US Coast Guard, which launched an air and sea search; an aircrew spotted the teenager on Monday morning, roughly two days after the capsize, and directed the fishing vessel Northwest Explorer to the scene. Its crew, sounding the ship's horn, pulled the skiff alongside and hauled the exhausted, hypothermic boy to safety, with the bodies of his brother and cousin recovered afterwards.