Rescued at sea: How Venezuela’s Machado survived the riskiest leg of her escape
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. “María!" A man’s voice cut through the rain pelting the pitch-black Caribbean Sea, just audible between two boats tossed around by 10-foot waves. People on the smaller vessel, a simple fishing skiff, held up cellphones like emergency flares in the night.
The larger craft pulled closer. A figure bundled in a bulky jacket and a black ball cap waved her arms. “It’s me, María." Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado had just endured the most perilous leg of her escape from her home country on her way to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in Norway.
It was early Tuesday morning when the extraction team rescued her. Part of it was recorded on video viewed by The Wall Street Journal. For the past three hours, Machado and a small crew had drifted on a skiff in the Gulf of Venezuela after its GPS fell overboard on rough seas and a backup failed.
She didn’t meet the extraction team at a designated pickup point, setting off a scramble to find her in the hazardous waters. Bryan Stern, a bearded U.S. combat veteran sent to extract Machado from Venezuela, said he hauled her onto the bigger boat and gave her snacks, Gatorade and a dry sweater.
He alerted his team that Machado was on board: “Jackpot, jackpot, jackpot." In a proof-of-life video sent to U.S. officials and shared with The Wall Street Journal, Machado tries to steady herself as the boat tosses on the waves. “My name is María Corina Machado," she says, “I am alive, safe, and very grateful." Stern, who leads an organization specializing in such extractions, staffed by former special operations and intelligence veterans, called the mission Operation Golden Dynamite.
Read on livemint.com