HONOLULU, Oct. 27 (UPI) — The U.S. Coast Guard assisted in the rescue of 36 crew members of a fishing vessel stranded after their boat became engulfed in flames in the Pacific Ocean.
The fishermen of the 229-foot Glory Pacific No. 8 fishing vessel, registered to Papua New Guinea, were rescued after spending more than 10 hours on several life rafts adrift about 2,070 miles southwest of Hawaii on Saturday.
The U.S. Coast Guard dispatched an HC-130 Hercules airplane from Honolulu to locate the Glory Pacific crew through their emergency radio beacon. The Lomalo civilian fishing vessel, registered in the Republic of the Marshall Islands, moved toward the Glory Pacific crew to rescue them from the water.
“The Hercules crew dropped smoke flares to help vector in the Lomalo crew and also dropped water to the survivors. The Hercules crew remained on scene and maintained communication with the Lomalo crew until all 36 fishermen were rescued,” the Coast Guard said in a statement. “The fishing vessel was last seen fully engulfed in flame, unmanned, unpowered and adrift. It may present a hazard to navigation and mariners are required to keep a sharp lookout to avoid collision.”
The Coast Guard said the Lomalo will meet with the Papua New Guinea-flagged commercial fishing vessel Pacific Journey No.1, where the survivors will be taken to their designated port in several days.
The Coast Guard received a request from New Zealand’s Rescue Coordination Center to provide help after the Glory Pacific crew reported the vessel caught fire and the crew evacuated.
“This case is a perfect example of the necessary and strong coordination between the U.S. Coast Guard and our New Zealand-based search and rescue counterparts,” Christopher Kimbrough of the Coast Guard Joint Rescue Coordination Center Honolulu said in a statement. “Our combined efforts coupled with the willingness of the Lomalo crew to help, led to the successful rescue of these fisherman in a very remote part of the Pacific. The fact that the Glory Pacific crew had the emergency equipment needed to abandon ship contributed significantly to the successful rescue of the full crew.”
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