Survivor Costas Konstantinou has described, visibly moved, the battle he and businessman Dimis Mavropoulos fought against the rough seas at Cape Greco last Saturday, in the tragedy that cost Mavropoulos his life.
Speaking on the programme “Enimerosi Tora,” Konstantinou described dramatic moments and called Mavropoulos a brotherly friend.
He said their group treats each other as family and returns to the area every year for their holidays, adding that he does not know if he will have the psychological strength to get on a boat again, and that they went through an extremely difficult experience.
He said they know every year there will be a day like that one, and that they always used to stay rather than leave, but that no one had expected such bad weather conditions.
“I’m alive by luck,” he said.
He explained that survival that day had nothing to do with being a good captain, and that whatever they did in that moment came down to chance. He said he tried to get away on a single propeller, and realised only then that he had struck the rocks below and could not leave, describing himself as lucky within his own misfortune.
Konstantinou said he watched the boat belonging to Mavropoulos’s friend Petsas being smashed to pieces, and saw Mavropoulos coming towards him. He said Mavropoulos tried to get away, and that he saw him sitting down by the anchor, with what must have been his daughter at the helm.
He said Mavropoulos managed to reach him, but the boat then turned side-on and a wave threw him onto the rocks.
He said the helicopter arrived afterwards, and that he let his crewman leave first before he himself was winched up, adding that he was not concerned about the boat, only their lives, since they did not know whether they would survive.
Konstantinou said he realised he would live once the helicopter picked him up. He said they waited a short while to see who would go up next, and that Mavropoulos’s daughter came up injured and frightened, adding that they went through a difficult experience.
