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A year has passed since the disappearance of Maxi Ludvik and Emmanuel Soria , the two young Argentinians who went missing in the early hours of 27 August 2023 when they went out paddleboarding from Huelin (next to Malaga Port). The two, who were lifelong friends, had planned to watch the sunrise while drinking mate (a popular beverage in Argentina) and sitting on the board. They were never heard from again. "We are trying to get back to living, but it's hard," Cindy, Maxi's only sister, told SUR following this sad, first anniversary.
In Mar del Plata (Argentina), where the two young men are from, their loved ones have not forgotten them for a single day. They are still scouring the Spanish media in the hope of finding a clue to help locate Maxi and Emma, who were 29 and 34 years old respectively when they were lost at sea. "But we never heard anything further, unfortunately," says Cindy.
The two friends met up in Huelin district in the early hours of that fateful 27 August without their mobile phones, setting off from La Misericordia beach. Those who knew them locally began to notice their absence after four o'clock in the afternoon because Maxi did not show up at the ice-cream parlour where he worked. That's when all the alarm bells went off. Neither he nor Emmanuel, who was on holiday in Malaga with his sister Cindy, answered any calls.
The morning Emma and Maxi went missing, there was a yellow alert for strong northerly winds of which they would have been unaware - at least their families are convinced of this. Following the report of their disappearance at the provincial headquarters for the National Police, a combined search and rescue effort was initiated by Maritime Rescue, Guardia Civil and National Police.
A day and a half later, at around 6.30pm on 28 August, the board they were on was found 15 miles off the coast . It was spotted from the air by the Helimer 207 helicopter involved in the search. A sailing boat passing by the area was responsible for its recovery.
The next and last clue about the young men came a few days later. It was a video shared by their own relatives showing the two young men going into the sea at La Misericordia beach with their paddleboard. The video had been recorded by a tourist early on the morning of 27th.
Since then, nothing more has been heard of them. Many members of Maxi and Emmanuel's families travelled from Mar del Plata to Malaga to follow the search operation. From the morning of 29 August both Maritime Rescue and the Guardia Civil, in collaboration with the Red Cross and Frontex (European Border and Coast Guard Agency), tirelessly searched the Alboran Sea, taking into account the probable course they would have followed given the wind - north-westerly when they disappeared - and the currents.
The search was suspended on 11 September, which was a hard blow for their loved ones. They needed to hold on to hope, however faint that might be, and in no way did they want to leave Malaga without knowing where the two young men were. As Cindy explains, they had no choice but to return to their home country and try to get on with their lives, despite the pain of leaving the young men behind, which they did after about a month.
"It was hard to go back, to be honest," admits Maxi's sister. What happened is still "very hard" for the two families. On 27 August 2024 both families met up again on the coast of Argentina to remember the young men on the anniversary of their disappearance. "It was a difficult and sad day, but every day is the same, they are difficult," says the young woman.
"We have to get used to living with this reality, which obviously hurts us and we don't like it, but it's what we've had to live with," she says. Although they have kept in contact with several of the people who were there for them on their arrival in Malaga, who showed their solidarity at one of the toughest moments of these families' lives, since the search ended they have had no further communication from the official bodies involved in the case, at least as far as Cindy is aware.
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