By Betsy Mayer
When their boat capsized off the northeastern coast of Queensland, Australia on July 6, 2004, the Nonas, a Pacific Islander family of 6, weighed their options as they clung to their upturned boat. They saw a large rock in the distance, but the 3-year-old couldn’t swim, so the parents urged their three older children, ages 15, 11, and 10, to swim on without them. The children remembered their mother saying: “You kids swim over to that rock area so that at least some of this family will be able to survive.”
Before the three swam on, their father, a pastor, prayed for God’s protection. Then they reluctantly set off in the shark- and crocodile-infested water for what became a several-hour swim.
For the first three days they huddled in a crevice on “the rock” with only oysters to eat, hoping their parents and little brother would soon join them. Then 11-year-old Bala convinced them
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Leah Berenson, “How Three Children Survived Being Stranded on a Deserted Island,” secretlifeofmom.com, April 4, 2024.
“Courageous kids: A lesson in survival,” soundingsonline.com, June 3, 2005.
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