Urgent search underway for fishermen missing in Gulf of Tonkin

Relevant agencies have urgently initiated searches for the TH 90282 TS fishing vessel which collided with the Annie Gas 09 ship in the Gulf of Tonkin, leaving one dead and several other fishermen missing.

Rescue forces take a crew member from the sunken ship to the mainland

The move to search for the lost crew comes after the Vietnam Maritime Search and Rescue Coordination Centre dispatched an additional SAR 273 rescue ship on June 10 in order to participate in the efforts, with two fishermen being successfully saved from the sunken ship, while the body of a crew member was subsequently taken back to the mainland.

The injured fishermen were then immediately taken to Viet Tiep hospital in the northern port city of Hai Phong where they received emergency treatment.

Additional rescue ships were mobilised to the scene at 8:00am on June 11 in order to continue the search for the missing fishermen, although the unfavourabe weather conditions combined with the strong winds and high waves have negatively affected all search and rescue activities.

Rescue vessels continue search for the missing fishermen

Rescue forces then discovered a fishing net at around 09:00am located close to the area of the sunken vessel’s location. Diving activities to conduct a search of the location will be carried out once the weather conditions become favourable.

Elsewhere, the ship owner of the Annie Gas 09 plans to hire two large fishing vessels in order to send them to the scene and use underwater detectors to search the ship’s wreckage.

This comes after the vessel crashed into the TH 90282 TS fishing vessel on June 9 with seven crew members on board off the coast of the port of Hai Phong.

Immediately after the collision, the TH 90282 TS fishing boat sank. While the Annie Gas 09 vessel was able to rescue two crew members from Thanh Hoa province, four fishermen still remained unaccounted for.

VOV