Sailors missing in treacherous waters
Rescue teams were searching yesterday for 26 crew members, including four Greek sailors, of a bulk carrier that snapped in two and sank in notoriously dangerous waters off South Africa’s southeastern coast, the Merchant Marine Ministry said. The Saint Vincent and Grenadine-flagged Alexandros T started taking on water after sailing through 5-meter swells 300 nautical miles from Port Elizabeth. Seven crew members were rescued from a lifeboat but the remaining sailors were not thought to have made it into a lifeboat before the ship sank. South African authorities said that the men were wearing life jackets and search planes were trying to find them. The missing seamen include Captain Panayiotis Vlismas, second-in-command Yiannis Karaminas, and engineers Nearchos Boukouvalas and Ilias Efstratiou.
