1.   His seaside village had become the primary launch for the balseros, those fleeing countrymen who believed flimsy rafts and steely desperation could conquer the waiting sea.

2.   No children are starving or being shipped out to sea in flimsy rafts.

3.   Unlike earlier refugees who used flimsy rafts, the latest arrivals often are smuggled across in boats loaded with large gas tanks.

4.   He was crossing the river in a flimsy raft during a visit to inspect the area.

5.   Neither saw any way out, except perhaps a flimsy raft to Florida.

6.   Tens of thousands tried to flee in flimsy rafts and untold hundreds, possible thousands, died.

7.   They were among tens of thousands who fled Cuba on flimsy rafts last summer after Cuban President Fidel Castro said he would make no move to stop them.

8.   Today the images of Cubans dehydrating and taking great risks aboard flimsy rafts to get to the United States are rare.