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Mariner rescued after 2 months adrift in Pacific

HONOLULU -- The U.S. Coast Guard says a Colombian mariner has been rescued after surviving a two-month ordeal in the southeastern Pacific, but his three companions reportedly died.

The agency says in a news release that the 29-year-old man survived by eating fish and seagulls after their 23-foot skiff became disabled in a lightly traveled area of the ocean.

A merchant ship that rescued the man more than 2,000 miles southeast of Hawaii April 26 notified the Coast Guard and he was brought to Honolulu in good condition Wednesday.

The release said the "three other men reportedly perished at sea," and their bodies weren't aboard the skiff. No other details on the deaths were immediately available.

The survivor, who wasn't identified, said the four of them had set out from Colombia more than two months earlier, but eventually their engine quit.

The Coast Guard and the Columbian Consul in San Francisco have arranged for the mariner's return to Columbia, reports CBS Honolulu affiliate KGMB-TV.

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