MEXICO CITY – Six inmates from the last island penal colony in the Americas were recaptured at sea after they used buoyant containers and wood planks to try to swim to freedom in an escape reminiscent of the 1973 movie “Papillon.”

The Mexican navy said the inmates used empty plastic gas or water tanks to help stay afloat as they swam about 60 miles south of the Islas Marias, a Mexican penal colony where inmates live in small houses and are normally not locked up. Prisoners can tend gardens and raise food.

The six men were only about 60 miles from the Pacific coast resort of Puerto Vallarta when they were spotted by a passing boat early Thursday.

The boat called in a tip to a local naval base, and patrol boats were quickly dispatched to take the men into custody. Photos provided by the navy showed them men sunburned but alert — and unhappy — on the deck of the patrol vessel.

The men, who range in age from 28 to 39 years, were taken back to Puerto Vallarta for a medical check and to be turned back over to prison authorities.

Later, the federal Public Safety Department, which is in charge of Mexico’s federal prisons, said the men had been found to be in acceptable health and would be returned to the penal colony “within hours.”

The department said the prison oversight agency wasn’t notified until Thursday that the men were missing from the prison — the same day they were found at sea, suggesting that their absence had not been noticed when they set off on the escape bid.

The Islas Marias penal colony lies about 70 miles from the mainland, but the prisoners did not swim to the closest shore, which is due east.