Kin of missing vessel's crew grow desperate

Dubai: Relatives of the crew of a Seychelles-bound vessel that disappeared after it left Dubai have said that they have been kept in the dark about the status of the search.

"We are desperate to get hold of anyone who will be able to provide us with information that can help us get any news of my husband," said the wife of a crew member in a phone interview from Tanzania.

"My mother-in-law and I have been waiting for any information that will help us find my husband. It's been over a month and nobody is speaking. I don't think they are taking it seriously enough," she added.

Reef Azania set sail from Dubai on June 18 and was expected to arrive at Mahe, Seychelles, on July 1 before continuing on to the Comoros Islands.

No contact

The company that manages the vessels, Zambezi Shipping, allegedly lost contact with Azania on June 24. Gulf News has learnt that there were 14 crew aboard but the number cannot be verified independently.

Another relative of a Tanzanian crewman provided Gulf News with an e-mail she alleges came from Zambezi Shipping on July 14 in which the company asks relatives to be patient.

The e-mail also claims that there has been no confirmation as to whether the ship has sunk or been hijacked. "There are a lot of rumours in Tanzania that the ship has sunk," she said.

According to her, the captain of the Reef Azania reportedly informed Zambezi about a leak in the vessel before the company lost contact with it.

Noel Choong, head of the International Maritime Bureau's (IMB) Piracy Reporting Centre in Kuala Lumpur, however, told Gulf News the centre was contacted by Zambezi Shipping on Tuesday telling them that the ship "may have sunk".

It is unlikely, he added, that the incident is a case of piracy since contact with the ship was lost 500 nautical miles off Somalia. "That area is too far from the shore to have a pirate presence," he said.

"Therefore we have stopped investigating the incident and notified the appropriate authorities in the area," Choong said.

The Rescue Centre on Reunion Island east of Madagascar is carrying out a search operation for the vessel or survivors, an official there confirmed. "We have been in contact with search and rescue authorities in the Arabian Sea and Seychelles," he said.

Gulf News tried to contact Port Rashid-based Zambezi Shipping, which manages the vessel, but officials in Dubai refused to confirm or deny reports of the missing ship. A Zambezi official in Tanzania, however, did say that the company had lost contact with the ship but did not give any further details.

An official at Port Rashid told Gulf News there is not much UAE authorities can do to find the ship if it disappears outside the country's territorial waters or if it is not registered here.