Northwest Explorer Pulls Teen Alive From Overturned Skiff Adrift on the Bering Sea for Days

A 15-year-old Alaska boy's boat capsized in the Bering Sea, and his brother never surfaced again.

For two more days, Derek Aghnaanga clung to that same capsized hull, drifting alone in the frigid water.

The current pulled him toward Russian waters while rescuers raced to find him alive.

Three Savoonga Fishermen Never Made It Home From a Halibut Trip

Derek, his 35-year-old brother Sidney Kulowiyi, and their cousin Barton Rookok left the village of Savoonga on Friday, September 4, to fish for halibut off St. Lawrence Island.

Sidney was running the boat.

Around 8 p.m., his fishing line snagged the motor and the skiff flipped in an instant.

Sidney went under and never came up.

Derek and Barton pulled themselves onto the overturned hull and held on through the night, with nothing but each other and the freezing spray.

By Sunday night, the night before rescuers found them, Barton could not take it anymore.

He let go of the hull and slipped into the water, and Derek never saw him again.

Derek was alone now, on a dead boat, drifting toward Russian territory in water cold enough to kill a grown man in hours.

The family reported the three missing Sunday night when they failed to return.

A Coast Guard Aircrew Spotted Him Drifting Toward Russian Waters

Monday morning, an HC-130 Hercules aircrew from Air Station Kodiak spotted a lone figure on the hull about four miles east of St. Lawrence Island, edging closer to Russian waters.

The crew dropped a survival raft, deployed flares, and radioed the Alaska Rescue Coordination Center.

The fishing vessel Northwest Explorer, captained by Adam White, was close enough to divert and pull Derek from the wreck.

Derek had been exposed to the Bering Sea for nearly two full days by the time White's crew hauled him aboard.

He was shaking so violently from hypothermia that his teeth chattered as he spoke.

White's crew wrapped him in blankets, packed him with hot packs, and radioed ahead for a medevac to Nome.

"Through the teeth chattering, he had mentioned that his brother was still under the skiff," White told local reporters.

A 15-year-old had just spent two days alone on a wrecked boat, and his first instinct was to tell searchers where to find his brother's body.

Derek's mother, Vina Kulowiyi, said her son later told her he was never afraid.

She said he survived, in his own words, on prayer, with no food and no water.

A relative, Darren Toolie-Noongwook, said that in the middle of the night, with waves hitting him, Derek was kneeling on the hull and praying, and that praying was all he was doing.

Savoonga Buries Two Men and Welcomes Home a Survivor

Sidney's body was recovered near the wreck.

Barton's body has not been found, and searchers have not called off the effort.

Savoonga is a village of roughly 800 people on St. Lawrence Island, closer to Siberia than to most of mainland Alaska, and everyone there either knew Sidney and Barton personally or knew someone who did.

This is not the first time the Bering Sea has tested an Alaskan fisherman's will to live.

In 2012, 19-year-old Ryan Harris survived more than 26 hours clinging to a floating plastic fish bin near Sitka after his boat capsized, repeating his own name to himself through the night to stay conscious until a Coast Guard helicopter hoisted him out.

Cold-water survival experts have long warned that most people lose useful function of their hands and legs within the first hour of cold-water immersion, long before hypothermia alone becomes fatal, which is exactly why staying out of the water on top of a hull, as Derek did, matters more than any survival gear.

Derek stayed on the hull. Barton and Sidney did not have that chance or that choice, and neither one survived the water.

He is recovering at home in Savoonga now, back with his mother, grieving a brother and a cousin while the rest of the country reads his name for the first time.

He just refused to let go.

Sources:

• Jim Hoft, "MIRACLE: 15-Year-Old Alaska Teen Found Alive After Days Clinging to Capsized Skiff in Freezing Bering Sea," The Gateway Pundit, September 13, 2026.
• Fox News Staff, "Alaska teen rescued after 3 days in frigid waters reveals tragic end for 2 family members," Fox News, September 2026.
• Alaska's News Source Staff, "'Through chattering teeth': 15-year-old tells rescue crew about surviving days at sea in a skiff, ship's captain recalls," Alaska's News Source, September 10, 2026.
• Alaska's News Source Staff, "Kneeling, praying, waves crashing, a 15-year-old survives waters of Alaska," Alaska's News Source, September 10, 2026.
• Anchorage Daily News Staff, "'One remarkably tough kid': Teen rescued from overturned skiff in Bering Sea, two others found dead," Anchorage Daily News, September 8, 2026.
• Fox News Staff, "Fisherman survives over a day adrift in a plastic bin in waters by Alaska," Fox News, September 11, 2012.