Chinese rescuers are continuing their search for more than a dozen missing sailors from a Vietnamese vessel that shipwrecked in the South China Sea over the weekend.
The Vietnamese vessel ‘Khoi Nguyen 18’ is thought to have sunk in the South China Sea in the early hours of Saturday, with rescue teams from China's Nanhai Rescue Bureau of the Ministry of Transport having deployed multiple vessels and scouring an expansive sea area of approximately 3,600 square kilometers.
Chinese authorities said 48 crew members of the sunken Vietnamese ship were rescued as of 9.00 a.m. Monday, including one person who was found by the Vietnamese side. A total of 62 people were on board the ship.
Since China's Nanhai Rescue Bureau joined the search and rescue operation on Saturday, the team has deployed professional rescue forces for multiple rounds of searches, including undertaking two vessel sorties and six helicopter flights.
The alarm was raised at about 6.23 p.m. on Saturday, when a vessel operated by Nanhai Rescue Bureau of the Ministry of Transport spotted suspected signals for assistance in waters near the Yongshujiao (Yongshu Reef) in the Nansha Qundao (Nansha Islands). After finding a life raft carrying multiple people waving clothes in a cry for help, the vessel approached the raft to carry out rescue operations.
So far, the rescue vessel ‘Nanhai Jiu 115’ has been designated as the on-scene command vessel, holding daily consultations with Vietnamese authorities to coordinate search plans. A total of 15 vessels are involved in the search and rescue operations in the area, including eight from China and seven from Vietnam.
As time passes, rescuers warn that it is becoming more difficult to predict the drift trajectories of the missing persons, while their potential drift zone continues to expand. Intermittent poor visibility in the area brought by strong winds and high waves is also posing further challenges for search and rescue teams.
