A BRITON and her partner, adrift in the Caribbean for four days on a small capsized sailing boat, were rescued by a passing Liberian oil tanker, authorities said yesterday.

At the weekend, Juliet Savage, 27, and Timmy Attard, 30, from Malta, had been sailing Mr Attard's 16ft catamaran around St Martin in the Virgin Island - which is shared by France and the Netherlands - where he works as a charter boat engineer.

About half a mile out to sea, one of the boat's pontoons filled with water and the vessel capsized - with the lighter pontoon jutting into the air, Mr Attard said.

The pair clung to the boat's side for four days with only two bottles of water, two chocolate bars and a granola bar. On the third day, they resorted to eating seaweed and drinking rain water collected on the catamaran's trampoline.

When three large sharks began circling, Mr Attard disassembled part of

the boat to right it in the water and the pair scrambled aboard, he said.

Both Dutch and US Coastguard vessels and planes searched for the boat for four days before the Russian crew on a Liberian oil tanker spotted it late on Tuesday, said Lieutenant Eric Willis, a US Coastguard spokesman.

Mr Attard said: "I was so happy to be alive. That ship was a miracle."

Bound for the Hovensa oil refinery in St Croix, the 590ft tanker's crew pulled Ms Savage and Mr Attard aboard about 46 miles south-east

of St Martin.

"We thought, well, someone will see us - and that someone turned out to be 90 miles later, " Mr Attard said.

Doctors examined the pair, who were suffering from exhaustion and a few minor injuries, but were expected to make a full recovery.

Initial reports that the catamaran was borrowed from a rental company were false.