Five people, including two children, were rescued this week in the South Pacific island nation of Kiribati after three months drifting at sea in a 20-foot skiff, authorities said. Another four remained missing.
Villagers rescued the group Sunday off Fanning Island in Kiribati, the Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported, after they had drifted an estimated 3,355 miles east from the Federated States of Micronesia.
The U.S. Coast Guard in Guam on Tuesday confirmed that the skiff with nine people aboard had been reported missing after it failed to return to Ruo Island in Micronesia on July 30. The group had been making a one-hour crossing between the islands of Murilo and Ruo at the time, ABC reported.
A 10-day search covering 33,000 square miles followed without any sign of the missing boat or those aboard, it said.
“Incredible and wonderful news these five folks were found and are receiving care,” the U.S. Coast Guard told The Associated Press in an email.
“Our profound condolences to family and friends of those who did not arrive with them,” the email added.
When asked by the AP what happened to the missing four, the U.S. Coast Guard said it was continuing to gather and confirm information and would reply as soon as possible.
A lawmaker in Kiribati, Kaotitaake Rakoroa, told ABC the survivors were being cared for by a pastor on the island.
Nursing officer Paukin Tororo told the ABC on Monday that all five were severely dehydrated and malnourished. They were put on intravenous drips and were showing signs of recovery.
“They can give a smile face, they show the sign they want to eat,” she told the ABC.
The survivors had yet to speak publicly about their ordeal and had requested privacy, the Australian broadcaster reported. ABC said the group went missing after their boat was caught in a storm.
The governor of Micronesia’s Chuuk state, Alexander Narruhn, issued a statement Sunday saying he had begun talks with the Kiribati government to bring the survivors home.
“There were nine people aboard the boat that went missing. Thanks be to God for his love and mercy that five of the nine have been found,” Narruhn said through an interpreter.
“We continue to pray for their four companions,” he added. Narruhn did not immediately respond to the AP’s request for comment.
Other rescues in the Pacific
There have been previous incidents where people have become lost at sea among the tiny island chains that stud the Pacific Ocean. An Australian man survived more than two months lost at sea in 2023 with his dog Bella after rough seas damaged their boat and its electronics system. Tim Shaddock, 51, had been traveling from Mexico to French Polynesia, but found himself drifting in the Pacific Ocean for more than two months. Shaddock and his canine companion survived by drinking rain water and eating raw fish that Shaddock caught, he said. They were spotted by a helicopter and rescued in July 2023.
Two American sailors and their two dogs were rescued after five months at sea in the Pacific in 2017. Jennifer Appel and Tasha Fuiaba were discovered 900 miles southeast of Japan by a Taiwanese fishing ship, the U.S. Navy said at the time. The vessel’s engine died during bad weather, and they were unable to get to land using the ship’s sails. The women said the boat drifted off course, and no ships were near enough to hear their distress calls. Water purifiers and a year’s supply of food aboard the vessel kept them alive, the Navy said.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is asking consumers to check their medicine cabinets after thousands of blood pressure medication bottles were recalled nationwide.
According to the FDA’s website, New Jersey-based Macleods Pharma USA is recalling certain lots of Olmesartan Medoxomil, Amlodipine and Hydrochlorothiazide Tablets.
The recall was issued on Oct. 7, 2026, with the FDA later instituting a Class II rating on Oct. 26, 2026. A Class II recall means the use of the affected medication may cause “temporary or medically reversible adverse health consequences.”
Related video: How to stay ahead of recalls
Officials said the recall covers 3,528 30-count bottles from lot 12251163A and 216 90-count bottles from lot 12251163B. Both lots expire May 31, 2027.
An enforcement report said the medication failed to meet quality standards, meaning the pills did not dissolve as required during testing.

Americans who take medication for high blood pressure may want to check their medicine cabinets after thousands of bottles of a prescription drug were recalled nationwide.
New Jersey-based Macleods Pharma USA is recalling certain lots of Olmesartan Medoxomil, Amlodipine and Hydrochlorothiazide Tablets after the medication failed to meet federal quality standards, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
The recall covers 3,528 30-count bottles from lot 12251163A and 216 90-count bottles from lot 12251163B. Both lots expire May 31, 2027.
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Consumers can check their prescription bottles for the lot number and National Drug Code, or NDC. The recalled 30-count bottles have NDC 33342-246-07, while the 90-count bottles have NDC 33342-246-10.
The FDA listed the reason for the recall as “failed dissolution specifications,” meaning the pills did not dissolve as required during testing.
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The agency classified the action as a Class II recall, meaning use of the affected medication “may cause temporary or medically reversible adverse health consequences” but the likelihood of serious health consequences is considered remote.
Macleods Pharma USA initiated the recall Oct. 7, and the FDA classified it Oct. 26. The recall remains ongoing and affects products distributed nationwide.
The recall comes weeks after another blood pressure medication was pulled from shelves over a similar issue.
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India-based Inventia Healthcare Ltd. recalled 13,567 bottles of 25-milligram chlorthalidone tablets in September after the medication failed dissolution testing, according to the FDA.
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Chlorthalidone is used to treat high blood pressure and fluid retention, according to Mayo Clinic.
Macleods Pharma USA could not immediately be reached by FOX Business for comment.

California voters are set to cast their ballots to determine the fate of a proposed billionaire tax that could see the Golden State lose wealthy residents and may not deliver the revenue advocates hope for.
The ballot measure, known as Proposition 40, would impose a one-time 5% wealth tax on taxpayers and trusts with assets in excess of $1 billion and use the revenue to fund state healthcare programs, public education and food assistance.
The tax would be payable over five years and covered assets would include businesses, securities, art, collectibles and intellectual property – though real property, pensions and certain retirement accounts would be exempt.
The threat of the wealth tax, which as drafted would apply retroactively to those who were California residents as of Jan. 1, 2026, has caused some prominent billionaires to move out of the state or relocate businesses – including Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Oracle founder Larry Ellison and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel.
Max Levchin, the billionaire co-founder of Affirm Holdings, told Bloomberg on Monday that he would “probably” leave California if voters pass the wealth tax.
“I love California. I think it’s beautiful,” Levchin said. “But the notion of the popular opinion saying ‘Actually, we’re totally OK with asset seizure because we just really, really need it,’ I just think that is so wrong.”
Proponents of the billionaire tax argue that it would bring in about $100 billion in revenue from the roughly $2.3 trillion in wealth held by the state’s billionaires in mid-2026, though a recent analysis suggests the tax could permanently shrink the state’s tax base over the long-term and with losses exceeding near-term revenue gains.
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Advocates contend that billionaires typically pay little in income taxes due to deriving much of their wealth from investments, so the wealth tax would raise additional revenue even after accounting for some departures and reductions in income taxes paid in California by those who leave the state.
UC Berkeley economists Gabriel Zucman and Emmanuel Saez co-authored a working paper with Paris School of Economics’s Jasper Boll that estimated the wealth tax could raise about $100 billion over the five-year collection window with minimal impact on income tax revenue, as billionaires pay about $3 billion a year, which represents 2.5% of California’s income tax base.
“We estimate that it could raise about $100 billion, with comparatively minor impacts on income tax revenue,” the economists wrote in the working paper. “Using empirical estimates of mobility responses to wealth taxation, we find that an annual wealth tax on California billionaires could raise substantial additional revenue even after accounting for income tax losses due to mobility.”
CALIFORNIA ENTREPRENEUR WARNS BILLIONAIRE WEALTH TAX COULD TRIGGER ‘GIANT SUCKING SOUND’ OF BUSINESS EXITS
However, a working paper by a pair of economists at the Hoover Institution, senior fellow Joshua Rauh and research fellow Benjamin Jaros, found that announced departures have reduced that tax base by about 30% and estimated collections would fall in the $28 billion to $36 billion range after assuming 10% avoidance by those subject to the tax.
They also conducted a net present value (NPV) analysis of the lost income tax revenue from billionaires, who contribute an estimated $3.3 billion to $5.8 billion per year, finding that over time those lost collections more than offset revenue received via the one-time wealth tax, with an estimated NPV of negative $38.9 billion.
It found that the NPV would be negative in about 85% of simulated outcomes, while it would be relatively small in about 15% of outcomes. Positive NPV suggests value is created on a net basis, while a negative NPV suggests a net loss over the time horizon.
REAGAN ECONOMIST WARNS BILLIONAIRE TAX WOULD ‘DESTROY’ CALIFORNIA
“These findings suggest that the Billionaire Tax Act will not fulfill the primary functions for which it was designed. Although the Act was designed to raise revenue, behavioral response prior to voting has eroded most of the projected tax base,” Rauh and Jaros wrote in their working paper.
“While the Act was framed as addressing a fiscal emergency, its one-time collections are roughly offset – and in most scenarios more than offset – by the present value of permanently lost income tax revenue,” the economists added.
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The Hoover Institution economists also noted that while the billionaire tax is being presented as a one-time measure, the legislature could amend it with a two-thirds vote without consulting voters – giving policymakers the ability to impose additional wealth taxes in the future.

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Indya Moore isn’t buying Martha Stewart’s excuse for her Halloween costume.
The 85-year-old caused a stir on the internet over the weekend after she posted a photo of herself as a panhandler. Stewart sported a dirty face wearing tattered clothes and held up a sign that said “I AM HUNGRY HELP ME!!”
Stewart deleted the photo after swift backlash and made attempts to apologize a few different ways.
“My costume was designed to bring the homeless and hungry to everyone’s mind and boy it certainly did!!! But not in the correct way, because I did not explain it and I am so sorry I care and I support causes who care,” Stewart said in the comments of a Just Jared post about backlash to the photo, before posing a question to her followers. “Do all of you???”
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Moore, an actor and model, took issue with the lifestyle icon’s choice of words, as she didn’t feel they were sincere. Moore also tagged different organizations for Stewart to support.
“Halloween has never been a time when people dress up as a demographic in need to raise awareness for them. Halloween is caricature: monsters, villains, idols. People do not dress up as groups who are in crisis,” Moore wrote, adding “This is why your excuse is not believable for so many people.”
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“It actually seems like you’re using the anger of people who have actually been hungry as proof your costume worked. It also seems like you apologizing for not writing a caption and our subsequent failure to understand the outfit — not because you wore it,” the “Pose” actor explained.
“A rich woman dressing up as a hungry, homeless person brings more awareness to how out of touch and apathetic wealth makes people than it does motivate people to empathize and activate,” Moore said. “If you were serious about poverty, you’d use your platform to back policies that tax the rich, put free food in front of people who are hungry and homeless and provide free healthcare and education. ‘I support causes’ is not a great response to people asking you to show your work.”
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Moore also pointed out that the “do all of you?” question was “passive-aggressive and insulting” to Stewart’s followers.
“An apology that ends in an interrogation of people you offended isn’t an apology. You turned a question about your judgement into an inquiry of your followers loyalty,” she explained. “Given how the wealthy treat the hungry and the homeless in this country, abandoning them, shaming them, fear-mongering about them, you should have known this would offend a lot of people.”
Stewart went on to release a statement to the media apologizing for her comments.
“I am distressed that my Halloween costume yesterday, which was intended to bring more awareness to the very serious subject of homelessness, has offended people, which was never my intention,” she said to People magazine, adding, “Homelessness continues to remain one of America’s greatest challenges and ongoing crises, something that I care deeply about and I have spent a significant amount of time and effort supporting charities that combat this ongoing social epidemic.”
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Stewart also later released another apology via her personal Instagram page, written in the Notes app.
“It’s hard to admit when you’ve really screwed up. My earlier statement didn’t go far enough. I know many people are suffering economically. Wearing a costume like I did was insensitive and not funny. I am very sorry,” she said.