Coast Guard rescues 18 fishermen off Karwar

KARWAR: The Indian Coast Guard carried out two operations to rescue 18

fishermen off Karwar

on Saturday. The rescued fishermen were on board fishing boats IFB Raj Kiran and IFB Maheel which developed

technical snags mid-sea

.


The distress calls were received on Friday night, but the Coast Guard could not immediately start the rescue operation due to the presence of a large number of boats which anchored at the coast following a red alert.

Rough sea conditions too had hampered the rescue operation. IFB Raj Kiran was stranded mid-sea on October 24, but the crew on board managed to send the distress call only on Friday night. On Saturday, Coast Guard and fisheries department personnel cleared the anchored boats before embarking upon the rescue act with the deployment of

ICGS Amartya

.

The Coast Guard carried out the operations in association with the

Uttara Kannada district administration

. The nine-member crew on board IFB Raj Kiran was the first to be rescued off Loliem near Karwar. Later, another nine people on board IFB Maheel were rescued. Communication with the IFB Maheel crew was tough as they could not converse in Hindi or the local language. Members of the crew belong to Andhra Pradesh and Odisha.

On Thursday night, eight people on board fishing boat Sohan were rescued off Karwar. The crew of Shravani, another fishing boat in the vicinity, rescued the stranded fishermen. The damaged Sohan was pulled to Kurmagad Island.