RIB rescue!

From Koh Phayam we went to the Surins for a few days.  Unfortunately the coral in both the Surins and the Similans has suffered from bleaching over the last couple of years.

The Koh Miang anchorage (taken in 2009)

At anchor off Koh Miang in the Similans we were in the cockpit playing cards, when Susan observed a very smart RIB heading out through the channel between the islands, with the tide and wind, but with no-one on board.  Was it was supporting a drift dive? Too fast to have divers attached.  We launched our RIB and collected the drifting boat.  There was a swimmer, complete with flotation vest, chasing the RIB.  He had swum at least 0.4nM (750 m) from the large motor yacht M/Y Amadeus from whence the RIB has escaped but he was losing the race. There were us and one fishing boat on a mooring between him and a 40 nM swim to the mainland!  We picked him up and reunited him with the RIB, which had apparently gone adrift during lunch.
 
In the picture we were on the second mooring from the left, the RIB was further E (right) when picked up and the fishing boat was on the last mooring (no tender) - then nothing till the mainland.

We can only assume and hope that the  skipper was not on board Amadeus at the time the boat became detached and that the crew member made the decision himself to try to rescue the RIB in such a potentially suicidal way.