A man on holiday in Greece miraculously survived 18 hours adrift at sea by clinging to a small ball.
The tourist named only as Ivan, 30, survived the ordeal thanks to a ball lost by boys on a beach 80 miles away.
Ivan was swept out to sea by powerful currents off the coast of Kassandra.
Desperate friends raised the alarm with the Greek coastguard after they spotted Ivan being pulled out to see helplessly.
After a number of hours passed, he was declared lost at sea.
But in a bizarre twist of fate, Ivan was saved when a child's ball floated towards him as he feared he might never be rescued.
Clinging to the ball allowed the tired swimmer to remain afloat.
Amazingly the ball had been lost ten days earlier by brothers Tryphon, 11, and six-year-old Thanos.
The pair had been playing with their favourite ball on Evgatis Beach on the Greek island of Lemnos on June 30 when it was swept away by tides.
By astonishing luck, sea currents brought the ball precisely into the path of North Macedonian tourist Ivan 80 miles away, saving his life.
The ball managed to keep him afloat until rescuers finally spotted him.
Ivan was plucked from the water on July 10 after 18 hours adrift, still clutching onto the ball.
By coincidence, the ball owner's mother spotted her son's toy on Greek TV and came forward.
After the rescue, Ivan said the ball, despite only being half-inflated, helped him to stay alive.
In a photo widely circulated by Greek media, the mayor of Kassandra, Anastasia Chalkia, posed with the ball alongside Ivan's father outside a medical centre.
The latest reports state that Ivan's friend Martin Jovanovski - who was also swept out to sea - remains missing.
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