French girl's message in a bottle washes up in North Carolina

Oct. 24 (UPI) -- A 12-year-old French girl's message in a bottle, dropped from a cruise boat, was carried by Hurricane Florence to the North Carolina shoreline.

A video recorded by family members captured the moment Amber Dorange, 12, tossed the message in a bottle overboard during an April cruise from the Caribbean to the Canary Islands.

The bottle, which was apparently caught in the waves caused by Hurricane Florence, turned up in September when Jake Wilson and his 5-year-old son were searching through debris on Sunset Beach in North Carolina.

"I said to my son Blake, I said, you know you have to check these bottles because one of them could have a message in it. And I honestly only walked about ten feet and it was like five seconds after I said that, the bottle was laying right there on the beach," Wilson told WFMY-TV.

Wilson said he was able to make out an email address in the French-language note and contact Dorange's mother.

"Her mom told me that she was very excited, wanted to call every family member and tell them that someone found the bottle and she, it was very hard for her to go to sleep that night, " Wilson said.

Dorange's family flew to North Carolina this week and the families were able to meet.

"We've been having a great time. It's just amazing that people will make a journey all the way across the Atlantic and you know something as simple as this bottle, you know, can bring people together," Wilson said.

He said he and his family are planning a trip to France to visit the Dorange family.