Search on for 89 missing from barge during Cyclone Tauktae

Mumbai | The Indian Navy (IN) and Indian Coast Guard (ICG) continued their search for missing 89 personnel from a barge with 273 people which went adrift and later sank near the Bombay High Fields unable to withstand the fury of Cyclone Tauktae, officials said here on Wednesday.

By late Tuesday, the IN-ICG teams managed to rescue 184 from the sunken Barge Papaa-305, with the help of Seaking helicopters, two naval ships and two offshore supply vessels.

Besides, IN and ICG also saved the lives of all 137 who were marooned on the Barge GAL Constructor with helicopter and ship operations near the Colaba Point.

In another cheerful news, 196 people on board a Barge Support Station-3 and 101 on an Oil drilling rig, which had gone drifting near the Pipavav Port, are now safe after giving alarming moments to the authorities the past couple of days.

OSVs hired by the Oil & Natural Gas Commission and Shipping Corporation of India are towing them to safe location even as INS Talwar reached the area where the two vessels had drifted late on Monday.

The ONGC said this morning that the two barges and an oilrig – barring Barge Papaa-305 which has sunk – are taken in control and their crew are safe, with the IN and ONGC engaged in the rescue operations for the crew of Papaa-305.

With these, a total of 618 people, plus two from a life-raft, have been rescued in different challenging operations in the Arabian Sea, braving extreme weather conditions, massive waves upto 8 mtrs tall, strong winds reaching over 150 kmph.

IANS

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