"23kg (50lb) of sardines for bait, 700 hooks, miles of line"
"Without bait or fish hooks, Alvarenga invented a daring strategy to catch fish. "
I am confused these statements are contradictory, did I miss something.
"Without bait or fish hooks, Alvarenga invented a daring strategy to catch fish. "
I am confused these statements are contradictory, did I miss something.
Can't imagine how long this took. In the middle of the ocean, most of the time you don't even see any fish at the surface. How long do you have to wait for one to swim right between your arms?
Tickling trout is a well-established (though generally highly illegal) freshwater fishing method.
We should also bear in mind that, at that moment, Alvarenga wasn't anticipating a year at sea. In fact, he was acting to prevent that fate. He believed that his first priority was the right the ship at any cost, because the alternative was capsizing or going adrift. From there, he'd planned to make it back to shore or be rescued in relatively short order.
It's too easy to critique his choices retrospectively. Some of them look bad on paper, out of context. But I've never been placed into that sort of context.
As a general rule, your first priority in any emergency at sea is to stay afloat. This directive overrules all others until you believe your vessel is stable and secure.