Vietnamese fishermen suffocate to death in fish cabin

By Hoang Hanh   November 19, 2019 | 11:59 pm PT
Vietnamese fishermen suffocate to death in fish cabin
A fishing boat in Kien Giang Province in southern Vietnam. Photo by VnExpress/Cuu Long.
Four Vietnamese fishermen have died of asphyxiation after entering a fish storage cabin in a vessel off the southern province of Kien Giang.

The dead fishermen were working for the fishing vessel owned by Nguyen Van Du, which was anchored around two nautical miles off the coast of An Bien District in the Mekong Delta province.

On Tuesday morning, border guards in the province received a call from the vessel seeking help, saying five crew members had fallen unconscious after they entered the fish storage cabin.

The border guards used canoes to take the victims to the Kien Giang General Hospital for emergency treatment.

The same night, four of them were pronounced dead by doctors. The other person continues to undergo treatment.

Initial investigations show that the deaths were caused by poisonous fumes in the cabin, which had been storing a large amount of seafood for a long period.

Local authorities are investigating the case further.

The number of workplace accidents in Vietnam dropped by 8.5 percent last year from 2017 to 7,090, with 622 deaths, according to the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs. The construction sector saw the highest number of workplace deaths last year.

46 percent of workplace accidents occur due to employers failing to provide safe working procedures or not providing safety training or equipment to the employees, according to the ministry.

Workplace accidents also caused loss of property worth VND5 billion ($215,400) in 2018.

 
 
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