Five crew members of an Irish vessel were rescued by coastguards today after spending seven days adrift at sea in a life-raft off the UK coast.
The Inis Mil is believed to have sunk after leaving Kenmare, Co Kerry nine days ago bound for France.
The five were rescued by helicopter from their inflatable craft this morning off the coast of Cornwall.
Suffering from hypothermia, the five had endured heavy seas and strong winds in their raft, which measured just 6ft by 4ft.
A spokeswoman for the RNLI said the crew, who are being treated in hospital, were lucky to be alive after their ordeal.
"They seem to be suffering from hypothermia and they were very hungry, but fortunately they are not too badly off," she said.
"It's been fairly blustery and stormy off the South West coast, so they are lucky to be alive."
The crew - a British father and son from London, two Germans and the owner of the boat, a French woman - left Kenmare in their 60ft converted trawler on September 6.
They were reported missing when the wife of the skipper alerted the authorities, a spokesman for the Irish coastguard said.
No distress alert was received from the vessel and search and rescue teams had been trying to locate it for the last few days.
It was not until the life-raft got into an area of mobile phone reception that an emergency call was made to coastguards at 9.18 this morning.
The crew were located off Trevose Head by a Royal Navy helicopter from RNAS Culdrose and the crew were taken to the Royal Cornwall Hospital at Treliske.