Hong Kong Finds Second Body After Sand Barge Capsizes; Six Sailors Missing

Hong Kong rescuers found a second body after a sand barge capsized following a collision with a container vessel. Six sailors are still missing.

“We will continue our search for the missing sailors, although seas are rough,” Chung Siu-man, an assistant director at the marine department, said in a press briefing today. The second body was found at 12:23 p.m., about nine hours after the ships collided.

Six other crewmembers were rescued from the vessel, including one who is hospitalized in stable condition, Chung said. Police boats and government helicopters began the rescue operations after the barge capsized and sank near the city’s Tung Lung Chau island.

The container ship is moored, and its nine crewmembers are safe, the government said in a statement today. The vessel, the HuijinqiaoO8, is about 50 meters (164 feet) long, Chung said. Both the container ship and the Runze001 sand barge are from China, he said.

The incident didn’t affect operations at the nearby Chai Wan harbor, said Patrick Wong, a marine department spokesman. Hong Kong’s port, the world’s third-busiest for container traffic, was used by 205,510 ships last year, according to the Hong Kong Port Development Council’s website.

The government is investigating the collision, Chung said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Marco Lui in Hong Kong at mlui11@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Neil Denslow at ndenslow@bloomberg.net.