Scared Sheetless: The Mummy on the Ghost Ship by Lily Verlaine (WARNING: Disturbing Photos)

(Warning: This article does contain some images that some may find disturbing. If you do not like looking at real deceased bodies/mummified, then only scroll down until the text ends.)

The Sayo

A Grim discovery.

Last Thursday Christopher Rivas, 23, a resident of P-4 Poblacion, in Barobo, was fishing together with a friend when he spotted a yacht, in seas off the southern island of Mindanao in the Surigao del Sur Province, about 50 miles off the Philippines. The pair decided to investigate as the white yacht had a broken mast, which led to a grim discovery when they boarded a ‘ghost ship‘ which could have been floating for years without a living crew.

When they opened the door of the cabin, they were shocked and horrified to discover the mummified body of a man sat in the spot where he died.The man who was identified as 59 year old Manfred Fritz Bajorat, was hunched over his arms as if sleeping, the radio mere inches from his hand as if he intended to make one final distress call.

Nobody knows for sure how long the boat drifted or the time of death, Bajorat had spent 20 years sailing around the world, including the Atlantic, the Pacific, the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean, the Agean and, when he was younger, the waters around northern Germany. He posted regular updates during his travels on his Facebook page, but the last time a friend heard from him was around a year ago. His grey mummified cadaver is believed to have reached a mummified state of preservation due to sea conditions, salty air, hot weather and dry winds.

Police Inspector Mark Navales from near by Baraabo town, said that they didn’t know what caused the death of this mysterious man, but it most likely to be natural causes. They appeared to be no signs of violence. Inside the 40 foot yacht called Sayo, investigators found a GPS system, photo albums, which contained battered photographs of himself and family from happier times, tins of food and clothes scattered around.

A friend of the dead man, who is also a fellow sailor called Dieter, who met the dead man in 2009, told Germany’s BILD newspaper, ‘He was a very experienced sailor. I don’t believe he would have sailed into a storm. I believe the mast broke after Manfred was already dead.’

The German embassy in the Philippines is working to try and trace his relatives. One clue may be that of a letter written to his beloved dead wife Claudia who died from cancer aged 53 on the 2nd of May 2010, they had had travelled the world together, though reports state that they separated two years previously. The thirty two page memoriam read, “Thirty years we’re been together on the same path. Then the power of the demons was stronger than the will to live. You’re gone. May your soul find its peace. Your Manfred“.

These tragic final words were discovered on a forum for sailors on the Internet called kaktusguenther.de. Mr Bajorat’s body was found sitting near to the radio telephone as if he was trying one last desperate Mayday call to save himself when he died, or was he reconciled to his fate and wanted to send one final message to the world.