A ship sinks off Yemen’s coast [Archives:2004/790/Front Page]

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November 15 2004

Agencies- A ship owned by a Gujarati businessman sank Monday near Yemen in the Arabian Sea and its 10 crewmembers were missing, according to a media report.
Yasinbhai, owner of the Al Share-e-Hind merchant vessel, said it had sunk near Socotra Island in the Gulf of Aden.
“My ship collided with the wreckage of a sunken ship believed to have sunk 10 years ago. Of the 19 crew members on board, nine swam their way to the shore, while 10 are missing,” Yasinbhai told a TV channel in Jamnagar, about 300 km from here.
“According to those who reached the shore safely, the missing crewmembers were in a life boat that is untraceable in the high seas.
Yasinbhai said he was keeping in touch with the Yemen government.
“The officials of the Yemen government told me that they had launched a search and rescue operation,” he said.
The ship had begun its journey a few days ago from Porbandar, a port town in the Saurashtra region, some 400 km from here, and was headed for Somalia with a cargo of 550 tonnes of rice.
Local authorities at Porbandar could not be contacted for comments.
On the other hand, alsahwa.net reported a Pakistani fisherman as saying that the ship which sank off Socotra coast had rescued him along with 8 of his comrades when their 70-ton capacity boat was wrecked somewhere between the Indian Ocean and the Arab Sea, close to Socotra Island.
Akbar Ali, the fisherman, told alsahwa.net that he and his colleagues had set off on a fishing trip from a Port in Pakistan.
“Our boat was shattered by the turbulent sea, and the ill-fated ship saved our souls,” said he.
“The number of crewmembers of the ship was 19, eight of whom were rescued by Socotra residents and the rest are still missing,” he added.
Official sources said the local security of Socotra had ferried the rescued on a military plane back to their countries- Pakistan and India.
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