The navy of the
“The fire is still raging there,” Sri Lankan navy spokesman
A Sri Lankan air force helicopter was picking up seawater in a bucket then flying back to dump the water on the burning tanker, air force spokesman Group Capt. Dushantha Wijensinghe said. The air force also was flying an observation aircraft to provide feedback to the authorities.
Air force photos showed smoke rising from the engine room of the ship but no visible damage or fire in other areas of the vessel.
The Sri Lankan navy sent four ships in response to the alarm it received Thursday, and they picked up 19 crew members who had left the burning tanker on lifeboats, Silva said. As the navy ships tried to put out the fire, the captain and two others abandoned the tanker.
Three ships from
The tanker's 23 crew are 18 Filipinos and five Greeks. The dead and injured crew are both Filipino.
The dead crew member was initially reported as missing and on Friday,
The injured man, identified as the third engineer of the ship, was taken to land and hospitalized. His condition is returning to stable, Silva said.
The tanker was carrying 270,000 metric tons of crude oil from the port of
At the time of the fire, the Panamanian-registered ship was about 38 nautical miles (70 kilometers) east of
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