Clearer pictures of Alvarenga’s vessel, which he said had carried him more than 6,000 miles from Mexico, also emerged Thursday. Alvarenga had left Mexico on a 24-foot boat and never returned.
“I pleaded to my all powerful God that if my son was still alive, that he would take care of him. If he was dead, that he would forgive him,” she said.
“But now I’m saying thank you to God. Blessed thanks to God because I didn’t think I would hear this news.”
The couple, who live in Garita Palmera, got word of Alvarenga’s oceanic ordeal after NBC News tracked down the castaway’s relatives in the U.S. and informed them of his whereabouts. They recognized him from photos and confirmed he had a barbed-wire tattoo on his arm.
