At least one man has died and six more are missing from a cargo ship that went down off Vietnam's central coast on Monday in the middle of a tropical storm.
The ship was carrying 13 sailors and a cargo of coal from the northern province of Quang Ninh to Nghe An. A distress signal was sent out at 2 a.m. as the ship was seeking shelter near an island, but then it went off the radar.
As of 2 p.m. on Monday, local coast guards had rescued six crew members and recovered the body of the deceased, who was wearing a life jacket.
Nguyen Van Sang was rescued from the ship. Photo by VnExpress/Hai Binh |
Nguyen Van Sang, one of the survivors who suffered head and leg injuries, said he was woken by screaming as the vessel quickly listed and capsized.
Rescue workers are searching for the remaining crew members, but no sightings of the 5,100-ton vessel have been reported.
The dead sailor was the first casualty of Tropical Storm Talas, the second storm to form in the East Sea and the first to make landfall in Vietnam this year.
Media reports said thousands of fishermen and tourists have been stranded offshore. Torrential rain has been sweeping through northern and central Vietnam, flooding streets in Hanoi and uprooting trees in nearby provinces.