VietNam Society: boat

Showing posts with label boat. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Passengers panic as hydrofoil seizes up

Passengers traveling on an express hydrofoil from Ho Chi Minh City to Vung Tau Monday morning were in for a rude shock when the engine seized up just 20 minutes into the journey.

Unable to fix it, the crew on the Greenlines boat herded the passengers into another vessel, which was already nearly full.

Thus, the other vessel, which had a capacity of 75, was carrying 125 people.

But for the passengers it was to be a case of jumping from the frying pan into the fire as fierce waves began to rock the boat. Some called their families and authorities, pleading for help.

Others pleaded with the boat captain to stop but he ignored them.

After the boat docked in Vung Tau, port officials discovered the captain did not have a driving license and there were not enough life jackets on board, Thanh Nien newspaper reported.

They have reported to transport authorities.

The passengers were furious with the company, saying it should have sent an empty boat to the spot to evacuate them.

Hydrofoil services between HCMC and Vung Tau, 120 km to the southeast, have been plagued with service and safety problems.

The fast boats take just one and a half hours to do the trip compared to four hours by road and so are popular with tourists. This leads operators to often overload the vessels.

Vietnam Air accepts web check-in for int’l flights

Monday, December 13, 2010

Heavy rains in central region leave at least three dead, two missing

Heavy rains in central region leave at least three dead, two missing At least three people were killed and two went missing while many roads and railways were damaged in the heavy rains over the weekend in the central region of Vietnam.

First statistics showed that three people in Khanh Hoa Province were killed, one electrocuted, one drowned and another wiped away in the water. They have not been identified, Saigon Tiep Thi said Sunday

More than twenty houses in Nha Trang, the province's resort town were collapsed and hundreds of others were 1-1.5 meters flooded.

Meanwhile, Van Cong Trai, the owner of a fishing boat from Binh Dinh Province that was caught in stormy waters on Saturday, has been reported missing along with Nguyen Van Loi, captain of a boat from Nghe An that sank on Friday.

All seven other people on Trai’s boat and the three on Loi’s boat were rescued.

Also on Saturday, the engine of a fishing boat from Binh Dinh carrying ten people cut out in rough waters. As of Saturday night, it is unknown if any rescue attempts have been made.

On Saturday morning, two ships that were anchored off Quang Ngai Province sank, causing damage amounting to more than VND300 million (US$15,400).

Rough waters have prevented rescuers from bringing the ships to the surface.

In related news, the heavy downpours flooded many roads in Phu Yen Province by up to one meter in some places.

As of Saturday, many communes cannot be reached, and flights to and from Ho Chi Minh City have been canceled.

Cam Ranh Airport in Khanh Hoa also canceled eight flights to Hanoi, HCMC and Da Nang on Friday.

Many trains came to a standstill as landslides damaged the north-south railway line in several places.

Authorities in Khanh Hoa and Ninh Thuan have planned to evacuate residents to high places as water levels are rising quickly.

Friday, December 10, 2010

Detained Vietnamese fishermen arrive home

Detained Vietnamese fishermen arrive home Nine Vietnamese fishermen released by the Chinese Fishing Patrol Force arrived home safely on Tuesday (October 26).

The crew pulled into the Dung Quat Port in the central province of Quang Ngai a month and a half after being detained while fishing off the coast of Vietnam’s Hoang Sa (Paracel) Archipelago.

Captain Mai Phung Luu of Quang Ngai’s Ly Son District and his crew were captured by a Chinese patrol on September 11 while fishing in Vietnamese waters.

On October 11, China said that it had released the nine Vietnamese fishermen and their boat.

But concerns over their safety arose after they failed to arrive home the following day, as expected.

Luu said that after spending a month in Chinese custody, their captors confiscated their communications equipment and released them on October 11. The crew began their journey home and their engine broke down soon and they spent five days adrift at sea.

The Chinese confiscated their communications equipment and Luu said the crew was expecting the worst when a Chinese ship arrived and towed their boat to Tru Cau Island.

Due to bad weather from the typhoon Megi, it wasn’t until October 25 that a Vietnamese rescue vessel arrived at the island to tow the boat back to Quang Ngai a day later.

Mai Chi Tam, Luu’s son said they survived their ordeal by catching fish.

“We were really scared,” Tam said. “We had to make a sail from a piece of canvas hoping the wind would carry us into the path of another boat so we would be rescued.”

On Wednesday, Tam and his family members were having their boat repaired in Quang Ngai while other fishermen returned to their homes on Ly Son Island.

“We will head out to sea again to make our livings,” he told Thanh Nien Weekly, adding that the seizure cost the family about VND150 million. The family said they’ll have to take out loans to finance future fishing trips.

In related news, rescuers are searching for the crew of a squid fishing boat that disappeared off the coast of the north-central province of Thanh Hoa.

The nine fishermen lost communication with coastal authorities on October 16.

The boat belonging to Nguyen Van Hop began its offshore fishing journey on September 9 in a floatilla of boats from the Ngu Loc Commune in the province’s Hau Loc District.

However, Hop’s boat was not among the cluster of ships that arrived home early on October 16 to avoid a coming typhoon.

The local government and area fishermen assembled a search party consisting of fourteen ships to search for Hop and his crew but they failed to find any trace of the lost vessel.

Nguyen Van Ap, Chairman of the Hau Loc District People’s Committee, the local government, said they’ve asked for support from the coast guard and other rescue agencies.

Hop’s wife, Nguyen Thi Thuy, said the crew went to sea with enough fuel and food for one to two months. The boat was fully equipped with communications and positioning devices but lost touch with the mainland on October 16.

Nguyen Van Tam, a fishermen on another boat in the group, said he contacted Hop and they agreed to return home to avoid typhoon Megi. Tam lost communication with Hop a few minutes later.

Nguyen Van Ngu, chairman of Ngu Loc Commune People’s Committee, said that a total of 130 fishermen have been lost in similar cases since 1996.

Pumkins are synonymous with Halloween throughout the world. Many hotels in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City are gearing up to offer Halloween-loving families a place to party.