Thirty people missing after military vessel capsizes in Gulf of Thailand
The Thai Navy corvette “HTMS Sukhothai” on its side in the waters of the Gulf of Thailand, December 18, 2022. AP
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The Royal Thai Navy has launched a rescue operation to find the 31 people missing offshore after a military vessel capsized in the Gulf of Thailand, while dozens more were rescued from choppy waters.
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Footage released by the Navy shows the ship completely leaning to one side, half engulfed in water.
During the night from Sunday to Monday, the crew would have "
lost control
" of the ship, which sank shortly after midnight (5 p.m. UT), 22 nautical miles (37 km) from the coast, at Bang Saphan, in the Prachuap Khiri Khan province.
As a result of the "
high tide
", the electrical system of the patrol corvette was damaged, to the point of causing the machinery ensuring its operation to stop, he explained.
On board
HTMS Sukhothai
were 106 crew members.
According to Admiral Pogkrong Montradpalin, spokesman for the Royal Thai Navy, 31 people were still missing on Monday, December 19.
Seventy-five crew members were rescued by the rescue mission, which includes two military helicopters, two frigates and an amphibious vessel dispatched to the scene, according to a navy statement.
On land, people covered in blankets waited to be treated in a hospital, according to a video clip.
About eleven people were hospitalized in Bang Saphan.
“
I follow the information carefully.
There are around five seriously injured
,” said Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha, a former army general who also serves as defense minister.
Bad weather
The American-made
HTMS Sukhothai
was commissioned in 1987, according to the
US Naval Institute
think tank .
Several regions of southern Thailand have been affected by thunderstorms and heavy showers in recent days, notably causing the interruption of ferry traffic between the mainland and the tourist island of Koh Samui on Sunday and Monday.
Severe weather.
Thailand's meteorological service warned on Monday that small boats should not set sail in the Gulf of Thailand due to thunderstorms.
In one of the worst shipwrecks in the country's history, more than forty tourists died in July 2018 near Phuket.
(
With
AFP)
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