A Madagascan minister was one of two survivors to have swum some 12 hours to shore Tuesday after their helicopter crashed off the island’s northeastern coast.
A search was still ongoing for two other passengers after the crash Monday. The country’s secretary of state for police, Serge Gelle and a fellow policeman reached land in the seaside town of Mahambo separately on Tuesday morning, apparently after ejecting themselves from the aircraft.
In a video shared on social media, 57-year-old Gelle appears lying exhausted on a deck chair, still in his camouflage uniform.
“My time to die hasn’t come yet,” says the general, adding he is cold but not injured.
Gella became part of a cabinet reshuffle in August after serving in the police for three decades.
The helicopter was flying him and the others to inspect the site of a shipwreck off the northeastern coast on Monday morning.
According to the latest official toll on Tuesday, at least 21 people have died and around 60 gone missing in that disaster.
Another police general, Zafisambatra Ravoavy, said that Gelle had used one of the helicopter’s seats as a flotation device.
“He has always had great stamina in sport, and he’s kept up this rhythm as minister, just like a thirty-year-old.
“He has nerves of steel,” he said.