Saturday, January 22 2005 22:28 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Port Blair: In a miracle survival a man sustained on coconut for 25 days after the tsunami hit and then rescued from an abandoned island in Southern Andaman and Nicobar, Naval Command sources in Port Blair said.

The Nicobarese tribal, whose age was yet to be ascertained, was found in his undergarment waving his shirt frantically on the beach of the partially submerged Pillow Panja Island on Wednesday.

The man Michael Mangal was traced when a team of four Nicobarese men were doing the rounds with a naval rescue team on a mechanised dingy around the island.

"We were surprised to see that a man was waving on the shore of an island where we had almost given up hope of spotting any survivor," Naval Command spokesperson Commander Salil Mehta told sources in Port Blair.

Mangal later told his rescuers that he had been swept away by a strong wave as tsunami lashed the island and then was thrown back to the shore by another wave.

The man, who searched for hutment and his neighbours in the small village in vain, retreated in the forest for a few days for fear of the sea and did not proceed to the shore.

Quoting his account of the tough life, which Mangal had to spend during this time, his rescuers said he initially searched for bananas to quench his hunger and then opted for coconut as he found nothing else.