Indian authorities attempt to tow container ship on fire with dangerous cargo off southern coast
NEW DELHI (AP) — The Indian Coast Guard was attempting to tow a container ship that caught fire off the coast of Kerala in southern India earlier this week to prevent a potential ecological disaster, Indian authorities said Thursday.
The Singapore-flagged MV Wan Hai 503 was on its way to Mumbai, India's financial capital, from the Sri Lankan port of Colombo on June 7 when it reported multiple explosions and a subsequent fire some 88 nautical miles from the coast of Beypore in Kerala on Monday.
Indian authorities have not yet given a reason for the explosions and fire. Officials were focused on firefighting and preventing the vessel from drifting towards the Indian coastline.
The 890-foot vessel carried 2,128 metric tons of fuel and hundreds of containers, including hazardous cargo, India's defense ministry said in a statement on Wednesday night.
'With the fire yet to be fully extinguished, efforts to establish a towline to pull the vessel away from the coast are underway,' the ministry said. 'The situation remains critical and is being monitored continuously.'
The firefighting efforts have significantly reduced visible flames, but the fire remains active on the ship's inner decks and near the fuel tanks, the ministry added.
Around 40% of the fire onboard the ship has been brought under control and the vessel remains afloat, according to a situation report by India's Directorate General of Shipping.
The coast guard launched an aerial firefighting operation Thursday morning using a helicopter from the Indian air force, Commandant Amit Uniyal, a spokesperson for the coast guard, said. The helicopter dispersed 1,000 kilograms of dry chemical powder onto the core fire areas of the ship, he added.
Shipping official Captain Harinder Singh told The Associated Press the vessel was carrying a total of 1,754 containers, including 143 with cargo deemed dangerous by the International Maritime Dangerous Goods Code, such as flammable liquids, toxic substances and solid hazardous materials.
The explosions and subsequent fire caused dozens of the ship's containers to fall into the Arabian Sea.
The coast guard on Wednesday airdropped five people onboard the unaffected stern of the ship to coordinate towing operations and assess the overall fire situation.
The coast guard successfully established a towline from the vessel to a coast guard ship to control its drift.
Singh, who is closely coordinating the operation, said authorities were working to establish a second towline with Offshore Warrior, a more powerful offshore supply ship with greater towing capabilities. Towing is expected to commence later Thursday.
The salvage master onboard the ship observed hydrocarbon vapors which indicates possible heat transfer near fuel tanks, the report said.
The vessel is managed by Singapore-based Wan Hai Lines. Of the 22 crew members onboard, 18 abandoned the ship with assistance from the navy and coast guard. Four are still missing.
The navy and coast guard have launched a search operation for the missing, aided by two Dornier aircrafts. The navy uses Dornier aircraft primarily for maritime surveillance, search and rescue operations. Five ships have also been sent to help put out the fire.
Last month, a container vessel sank in another accident off the Kerala coast, releasing 100 cargo containers into the Arabian Sea, and leaving authorities in the state scrambling to contain an oil spill.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Someone Somehow Survived That Massive Boeing Jet Explosion
On Thursday, a Boeing jet crashed just moments after taking off from an airport in Ahmedabad in western India. The Air India airliner, carrying 242 passengers, slammed into a nearby medical college and exploded in an enormous fireball. Somehow, one man survived: 38-year-old Viswash Kumar Ramesh. "I don't know how I am alive," Viswash said, according to his younger brother Nayan Ramesh, as quoted by the New York Times. In a video widely shared on social media, the India-born British citizen can be seen limping away from the crash site and towards an ambulance, his shirt bloodied and with what appears to be ash clinging to his hair and clothes. It's almost certain that everyone else onboard perished in the disastrous crash, including Viswash's brother Ajay. The siblings were returning to England after a vacation in India. Ramesh echoed his disbelief in an interview from his hospital bed. "I still can't believe how I got out alive," he told Indian state-owned broadcaster DD News, as quoted by the NYT. "I thought I was also about to die." Officials are still investigating the cause of the crash of Air India Flight 171, which could take months or even years to determine. One compelling piece of evidence so far is footage of the takeoff from several angles. As the airliner, a Boeing Dreamliner 787, rises from the runway, it can be seen losing lift, before eerily floating down to the streets below. Data from the flight-tracking service Flightradar, which was shared in a tweet, indicates that the jet reached a maximum altitude of 625 feet — with the airport's altitude at about 200 feet — before plunging at a rate of 475 feet per minute. Additional data from the aviation analytics firm Cirium cited by the NYT showed that the jet, which was delivered in January 2014, had racked up more than 41,000 flight hours, and had taken off or landed nearly 8,000 times over its career — which is typical for its class and age. What this all means is unclear. Some experts have speculated that this could be a case of an extremely rare double engine failure, while others have disputed this explanation. It's far too early to know for sure, regardless. Per the NYT, Ramesh recalled that the plane felt "stuck five or 10 seconds after takeoff," and that the pilot was trying to accelerate the aircraft. "But it was struggling," he said. Ramesh was sitting in seat 11A, a number which has already become immortalized online. After the crash, Ramesh said he unbuckled his seatbelt and looked for an exit, seeing that the right side was blocked off by the wall of a building, with passengers unable to escape. "I could see in front of my eyes the air hostesses and others — just everybody caught in it." On the other side, "as soon as the door broke, I could see that it was open for me and I had a chance to get out," Ramesh said, adding that he burned his hand when the fire erupted. The horrific tragedy will heighten the scrutiny on Boeing. This is the first crash that its 787 Dreamliner has been involved in since it was launched in 2011, but the company has been embroiled in scandal after two deadly crashes with its 737 MAX 8 in 2018 and 2019, killing 346 people. The scrutiny was renewed in early 2024, when a "door plug" on a Boeing 737 MAX 9 blew out midflight. Air India also has a history marred with deadly crashes, including one in 2010 that killed 158 people, and its most recent occurring in 2020, with 21 dead; in both, pilot error was implicated. More on: Boeing Jet Explodes in Giant Fireball, Killing Hundreds
CNN
2 hours ago
- CNN
A miracle in seat 11A: What we know about the sole survivor of Air India crash Vishwash Kumar Ramesh
CNN — It seemed impossible, but shortly after news broke that an Air India flight had crashed in the city of Ahmedabad, video started circulating on social media showing a man walking from the scene in a bloodstained shirt. Then, it emerged there was one survivor: a British national of Indian origin, identified as Vishwash Kumar Ramesh by the Hindustan Times. 'Thirty seconds after takeoff, there was a loud noise and then the plane crashed. It all happened so quickly,' it quoted him as saying in an interview at the hospital where he was being treated. He said he had been visiting family and was returning to the UK with his brother, who had been sitting in a different row. He didn't know if his brother had survived, he said. Air India later confirmed that of the 242 people on board the flight, 241 had died, making Ramesh the sole survivor. His cousin Ajay Valgi told reporters in Leicester, England, that Ramesh had called his family to tell them he's 'fine,' adding that they were upset about his brother and all of the others who died. A doctor told CNN that Ramesh's condition was 'not very critical' and that he could be released in the next couple of days. 'He has some blood in the images, but he's not very badly injured. He is very comfortable and under strict observation, no issues,' said Dr. Rajnish Patel, professor and head of surgery at Ahmedabad Civil Hospital. Indian news outlets have shared a photo of Ramesh's boarding pass, which indicates that he was in seat 11A of the flight, in the emergency exit row, just in front of the plane's left wing. CNN hasn't independently confirmed the veracity of the photo. CNN safety analyst and former US Federal Aviation Administration safety inspector David Soucie expressed surprise that someone seated at that part of the plane would survive such a crash. That seat is 'right where the spar of the wing would go under and it would be a solid place for the aircraft to hit the ground, but as far as survivability above it, that is incredibly surprising,' he told CNN. Ramesh told Indian broadcaster Doordarshan that he escaped through a small space near the door by his seat. He said his hand was burned by the flames as he fled from the aircraft. 'I don't know how I managed to escape,' Ramesh said, adding that he saw other passengers die in front of him. 'For some time, I thought I was also going to die. But when I opened my eyes, I realised I was alive and I tried to unbuckle myself from the seat and escape from where I could,' he said. Ramesh's survival was described as miraculous by a British member of parliament. 'It's nothing short of a miracle. I have reached out to the family and I'm choosing to respect their privacy at this trying time. But as you may have picked up … one of his brothers was also on that flight who sadly didn't survive,' Shivani Raja, member of parliament for Leicester East, told CNN's Max Foster on Thursday. People inside the BJ Medical College and Hospital hostel were also killed when the plane crashed into it, a senior doctor at the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital, where a majority of the dead and injured people were taken, told CNN. The doctor added that the death toll is likely to rise. Earlier Thursday, Swapnil Bhalodia of the Indian Medical Association Medical Students Network said at least three medical students had died in the crash and another 30 were injured. The plane was headed for London's Gatwick airport and was carrying Indian, British, Canadian and Portuguese nationals.
Bloomberg
2 hours ago
- Bloomberg
Dead Bodies, Mangled Luggage, Debris Haunt Rescuers at Air India Crash Site
Students of the B.J. Medical College were having lunch in their hostel dining hall on Thursday when a Boeing 787 jet loaded with fuel smashed into the building and exploded. Flight AI171 had taken off just minutes earlier from a nearby airport in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad, before making a perilous descent that ended in the death of all but one of the 242 people aboard. The number of casualties among those on the ground and the building the plane slammed into is less clear.
