German Man Inflates Jeans to Survive Three Hours in Sea

01This is what's trending today.

02Arna Mirka is crediting his blue jeans with saving his life.

03The 30-year-old German man was thrown off a sailboat in rough seas near New Zealand.

04Mirka says he turned his jeans into a life jacket that kept him afloat for over three hours.

05He was later rescued by a Coast Guard crew.

06The German was sailing with his brother in Talaga Bay on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island.

07They reportedly had agreed to take the boat, the yacht Wahoo, to Brazil.

08The trip was uneventful until the yacht's boom turned suddenly, hitting Arna Mirka and knocking him in the water.

09Luckily, I knew the trick with the jeans, he told the New Zealand Herald newspaper.

10Without the jeans, I wouldn't be here today.

11They were really the thing that saved me.

12Mirka added that he took the yacht delivery job in order to raise money for his 10-month-old daughter.

13She lives with his girlfriend in the Philippines.

14While I was in the water, I was just thinking, I can't leave my daughter behind without a father.

15That was the biggest motivation, he said.

16Mirka said he tied knots at the end of the legs and pulled them over water to get air inside.

17He then forced his jeans underwater to trap air and create a life jacket.

18A rescue helicopter found the German about three and a half hours after he fell from the boat.

19Images of Mirka floating in the water while being rescued have been appearing on the Internet.

20Chris Henshaw is the senior search and rescue coordinator for Rescue Coordination Center, New Zealand.

21He said in a statement that the yacht had communications devices, including radio and emergency beacons, which helped alert rescuers.

22Without these devices, Henshaw noted, it may have turned out differently.

23And that's what's trending today.

24I'm John Russell.