A cargo ship that had been transporting about 3 000 new vehicles to Mexico sank in the north Pacific weeks after an onboard fire broke out and its crew safely abandoned the vessel.
The Morning Midas sank on Monday in international waters off Alaska’s Aleutian Islands chain, Zodiac Maritime, the London-based ship management company, confirmed in a statement.
“There is no visible pollution. Right now we also have vessels on scene to respond to any pollution,” Cameron Snell, an Alaska-based US Coast Guard spokesperson said.
Fire damage compounded by bad weather and water seepage caused the carrier to sink in waters approximately 5 000 metres deep and about 770km from land, the statement said.
The ship had been carrying about 3 000 new cars destined for Mexico. It is not clear at this stage if any of the cars were removed before the vessel sank.
A salvage team arrived days after the initial blaze broke out on 3 June, leaving the ship powerless and adrift.
“Two salvage tugs containing pollution control equipment will remain on scene to monitor for any signs of pollution or debris,” said Zodiac Maritime.
The crew members of the two vessels were not injured when the Morning Midas sank.
Zodiac Maritime said it was also sending a specialised pollution response vessel as an added precaution.
The Coast Guard said it had received a distress alert on June 3 about a fire aboard the Morning Midas, which was roughly 490km southwest of Adak Island, which is 1 930km west of Anchorage.
The vessel had 22 crew members on board who all evacuated to a lifeboat and were rescued by a nearby merchant vessel. No injuries were reported.
Morning Midas was carrying about 70 fully electric and around 680 hybrid vehicles as well as internal combustion engine-powered vehicles at the time of the incident.
The 183m-long Morning Midas was built in 2006 and sails under a Liberian flag. The car and truck carrier left Yantai, China, on May 26, en route to Mexico, according to the industry site marinetraffic.com.
