The case of the ‘ghost ship’ found after nine years missing is solved
The ship was found on the shore of a beach in Burma without crew or cargo.
Last Thursday, the police of the municipality of Thongwa (Burma) reported through the social media about the discovery of a large rusty ship.
A ghost ship that was found adrift near the region of Rangoon, without crew or cargo on board.
When they inspected the ship, the authorities only found a group of five fishermen inside. As per the BBC, the fishermen entered only to take a look at the ship, in case they could benefit from the law of the sea. Since then, the authorities have investigated the origin of the Sam Ratulangi PB 1600.
In statements to the local media, the general secretary of the Independent Federation of Seafarers of Burma, U Aung Kyaw Linn, shared that the ship was in perfect condition and that it was quite likely that it had been abandoned recently. For that very reason, the authorities began an investigation to solve the mystery.
The mystery of the ghost ship is solved
After two cables attached to the bow of the ship was found, the police began to suspect that the ship was being towed by a second vessel. A few hours later, the authorities found a tugboat, named Independence, located about 80 kilometers away from the coast of Myanmar.
After the police questioned the 13 crew members of this vessel, they
discovered that the tugboat had been transporting the ship since August 13. In statements to the authorities, the crew has revealed that they had planned to take the ship to a scrapyard in Bangladesh, where it would be completely dismantled.
The crew abandoned the ship because of bad weather
However, the bad weather led the crew to abandon the ship. Per the crew, the waves and strong wind broke the two cables with which they were towing the Sam Ratulangi PB 1600. For this reason, they made a decision to abandon the ship and let it drift. As a result, the team made up of Burmese authorities and marines found the ship completely desolate.
It is estimated that hundreds of commercial ships are dismantled every year in the port of Chittagong, the second largest city in Bangladesh . So, the Sam Ratulangi PB 1600 was to be another of those ships that was to be completely dismantled.