Fat Man Floating

One of the secrets to an enjoyable cruise is whatever you do, don't jump off the ship. And if you do jump, be sure you're fat enough to float for awhile:

MIAMI — A 35-year-old Orlando man can thank his 300-pound girth for helping save his life after he jumped off a cruise ship and drifted 20 miles for more than eight hours with a collapsed lung before rescuers found him in the Atlantic Ocean.

Michael Mankamyer's family thought he was dead. The Carnival Glory cruise ship continued on its scheduled route toward the Bahamas after the Coast Guard arrived. And Mankamyer was left bobbing in the Atlantic Ocean.

"We were hysterical," Gina Mankamyer, who described her brother as an average swimmer, told the Orlando Sentinel. "We were already thinking about having to plan a funeral without a body."

Petty Officer Ryan Coon spotted Mankamyer about 75 yards from the Coast Guard cutter Chandeleur."I knew that was our guy," Coon recalled. "I hollered out, 'Man overboard, portside!' "

His 300-pound girth likely helped him float easier than someone leaner, said Richard Rotundo, a professor at the University of Miami's Miller School of Medicine specializing in cell biology and anatomy.

"Someone who is really overweight and has excess fat, their body density would be less than water," Rotundo said. Layers of fat also would insulate Mankamyer from the water,

He might have been found earlier but whaling has been outlawed in those waters.