For those of us in a first-world country - a PLB or some type of satellite distress device would be an excellent choice. I'm not sure that the fishermen (Ecuadorian or Panamanian?) had the opportunity to buy such a device.

I went back and read the actual article from the Globe and Mail.

It leaves a convincing feeling in your head that the crews of some of these cruise ships don't have much mastery of seamanship or emergency drills.
OR alternatively ... that the crew and the captain knew exactly what they were doing. And they pretended to have bad communications. But really the cruise line had given secret instructions to avoid picking members of stranded vessels - perhaps to avoid legal liability or risks from piracy ???

Pete2