Berlin, (APP – UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News – 12th Oct, 2024) Fire broke out on board a small oil tanker off Germany Friday, with seven crew rescued from the burning vessel in the Baltic Sea, emergency services said.
Eyewitnesses reported a loud explosion around 9:15 am local time (0715 GMT), said local newspaper Ostsee-Zeitung, and dark smoke soon billowed from the ship, which the report said is used to resupply vessels at sea with fuel.
“A fire broke out on the Annika tanker on Friday morning,” the Central Command for Maritime Emergencies said, adding that the vessel was carrying about 640 tonnes of fuel oil.
“All seven crew members on board were picked up and brought to shore,” they said, later adding that several of them had sustained minor injuries.
Emergency service vessels and helicopters were deployed to fight the fire on the ship, 4.5 kilometres (three miles) off shore in the Mecklenburger Bay, in waters between the towns of Kuehlungsborn and Warnemuende.
The German-flagged ship is 73 metres (240 feet) long and 12 metres wide.
By 7:30 pm local time, the fire had been “largely brought under control” and was no longer spreading, the central command said.
The tanker was being towed to the port of Rostock where efforts would continue to fight the fire, it added.
Representatives of the salvage company had been able to board the vessel and assessed the situation as “stable”, while firefighters were also on board to monitor the fire.
Video published by Bild daily online had earlier showed a fire-fighting vessel aiming a powerful jet of water at the ship.
Around six hours after the blast a central command spokeswoman told AFP that there was “no oil escaping at the current time”.
A maritime police spokesman in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania said that a full investigation would only be possible once the fire has been put out.
