MANAMA, 24 March 2004 — A crew member was still missing Tuesday after an oil tanker collided with a fishing boat off Oman the previous day, but a fire caused by the crash has been extinguished, an official here said.
Capt. Abdul Munim Janahi, head of the Marine Emergency Mutual Aid Center (MEMAC), said that all but one of the multinational 45-member crew on the Maltese-flagged “Everton” tanker had been rescued.
“The search continues to recover the sailor as well as the fishing boat which caused the accident before taking flight,” he said. “The fire has been extinguished aboard the Everton ... and a small oil spill is under control,” Janahi added.
“We’re waiting for a tugboat from Qatar to pull the tanker to a safer zone, because it is in a sector where waves reach a height of five meters (16 feet), posing the huge risk of a catastrophe.”
The tanker was carrying an estimated 80,000 tons of oil when it collided with what is believed to be a Korean-flagged fishing boat, named “Chunying”, some 45 kilometers off the Omani coast.
A US warship responded to an SOS call from the tanker.
