Shipwrecked on a desert island, coconuts and other fruits formed the basis of the sailors' diet.
This is from the SAT exam. The problem is that the word shipwrecked is misplaced, but it is not the point.
I can't understand why it is other fruits and not the other fruits. The island, obviously, didn't have all fruits present, but some group of them; that's why the other fruit would refer to "the fruits that grew at the island."
Later you have 'the sailors', a similar situation, but now with the.
Answer
Shipwrecked on a desert island, coconuts and other fruits formed the basis of the sailors' diet.
By saying the other fruits, you imply that either coconuts and all other fruits known to man were eaten, or coconuts and all other fruits on the island were eaten.
Now, it is highly unlikely that the island provided only edible fruits. A lot of fruits are poisonous, foul-tasting, or otherwise unfit for human consumption.
"Other fruits" just implies that the sailors ate other fruits besides coconuts, not "all the other fruits besides coconuts".
The sailors simply refers to the specific group of sailors that was shipwrecked on the island, not "sailors in general", but "people who happened to be sailors".
(I will ignore the fact--and you had already noticed it--that the sentence implies the fruits were shipwrecked and then were eaten.)
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