The tireless search for Héctor Márquez, the Oaxaca fisherman missing for a week
The man was sighted alive from a cargo ship that gave him fuel and supplies but did not rescue him despite early media reports to the contrary. Community members are still out looking for him
Héctor Márquez, aka Chico, went out very early on Monday, August 31 to fish aboard his small motorboat, which he named Josmarcito, off the coast of Puerto Ángel, in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. He had only enough fuel for the routine trip, no more than a few hours. This Monday marks a week since he went missing. Fishermen from his community have gone out to search for him every day. Family and friends keep vigils on the shore awaiting news of Chico.
Good news arrived this past Sunday. According to local media, a cargo ship sighted him at sea the day before, photographed him and recorded his coordinates, which it later shared with the community. The facts are somewhat unclear at this point as to why they did not rescue him. Media reports say Chico refused to leave his boat and preferred to wait for a rescue from his own community. The cargo ship provided him with fuel and some supplies. “So we have to get to that point and start tracking him, because he didn’t want to get on the ship. He stayed, and we have to go help him,” a fisherman said in a video posted on social media by people from Chico’s community.
The photo of Márquez, in which he appears to be making a kind of upward salute with a calm expression on his face, triggered a flood of news items suggesting the castaway had been rescued. But relatives of the fisherman have clarified on their social media that he remains missing and have called for the search to continue. Other accounts have asked the public to help by donating provisions and gasoline to the fishermen who are setting out to look for him.
“I ask you, please: to all those people who are posting that my brother is already safe, I want to tell you that as his family we know he is alive, but no ship has picked him up, it only gave him provisions, and no rescue vessel has taken him aboard. Let us continue praying that the boats that left Puerto Ángel will find him,” two of Márquez’s brothers posted on Facebook.
There is no official information so far on whether any authority, the Secretariat of the Navy or the Government of Oaxaca is assisting in the search for Chico. His relatives have uploaded videos showing several fishermen pushing their own boats into the water with jerrycans of fuel on board, heading out to sea. Meanwhile, dozens of people stand on the sand looking at the horizon. “We will find him, we will find him,” a fisherman is heard saying in one of the videos.
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