Indian oil tanker suffers explosion off Oman, 3 crew missing

The ship was headed toward eastern emirate of the UAE, Fujairah when the blast happened. (Shutterstock/File)
Updated 15 August 2018
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Indian oil tanker suffers explosion off Oman, 3 crew missing

  • Indian shipping company says one of its crude oil tankers suffered an explosion off the coast of Oman
  • The Shipping Corporation of India says the explosion struck the MT Desh Vaibhav on Tuesday in the Gulf of Oman

DUBAI, UAE: An Indian shipping company says one of its crude oil tankers suffered an explosion off the coast of Oman and three of its sailors are missing.
The Shipping Corporation of India says the explosion struck the MT Desh Vaibhav on Tuesday in the Gulf of Oman while it was en route to Fujairah on the eastern coast of the United Arab Emirates.
The shipper says one crew member suffered burns in the blast and was evacuated by helicopter. It says the Omani navy and other ships responded to the fire.
A subsequent stock disclosure filed by the shipper said: “The fire has been extinguished and the ship is fully manned and operational.”
The company did not identify the nationalities of the missing. A company spokesman declined to comment Wednesday.


Libya says UK to analyze black box from crash that killed general

Updated 9 sec ago
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Libya says UK to analyze black box from crash that killed general

TRIPOLI: Libya said on Thursday that Britain had agreed to analyze the black box from a plane crash in Turkiye on December 23 that killed a Libyan military delegation, including the head of its army.
General Mohammed Al-Haddad and four aides died after a visit to Ankara, with Turkish officials saying an electrical failure caused their Falcon 50 jet to crash shortly after takeoff.
Three crew members, two of them French, were also killed.
The aircraft’s black box flight recorder was found on farmland near the crash site.
“We coordinated directly with Britain for the analysis” of the black box, Mohamed Al-Chahoubi, transport minister in the Government of National Unity (GNU), said at a press conference in Tripoli.
General Haddad was very popular in Libya despite deep divisions between west and east.
The North African country has been split since a NATO-backed revolt toppled and killed longtime leader Muammar Qaddafi in 2011.
Haddad was chief of staff for the internationally recognized GNU, which controls the west. The east is run by military ruler Khalifa Haftar.
Chahoubi told AFP a request for the analysis was “made to Germany, which demanded France’s assistance” to examine the aircraft’s flight recorders.
“However, the Chicago Convention stipulates that the country analizing the black box must be neutral,” he said.
“Since France is a manufacturer of the aircraft and the crew was French, it is not qualified to participate. The United Kingdom, on the other hand, was accepted by Libya and Turkiye.”
After meeting the British ambassador to Tripoli on Tuesday, Foreign Minister Taher Al-Baour said a joint request had been submitted by Libya and Turkiye to Britain “to obtain technical and legal support for the analysis of the black box.”
Chahoubi told Thursday’s press briefing that Britain “announced its agreement, in coordination with the Libyan Ministry of Transport and the Turkish authorities.”
He said it was not yet possible to say how long it would take to retrieve the flight data, as this depended on the state of the black box.
“The findings will be made public once they are known,” Chahoubi said, warning against “false information” and urging the public not to pay attention to rumors.