Cyclone Tauktae: Navy rescues 177 from barge; rescuees land in Mumbai

Battling extreme weather the Indian Navy has so far rescued 177 people on board a barge that went adrift in the Arabian Sea near Mumbai hours before Cyclone Tauktae made landfall on the Gujarat coast an official said on TuesdayNavy ships were deployed on Monday after receipt of a request for assistance for barge P305 adrift off Heera oil fields in Bombay high area with 273 personnel on board The oil fields are around 70 km southwest of MumbaiSixty persons on board the barge were rescued till 11 pm and the remaining overnight the official said adding a Navy helicopter brought three rescuees to INS Shikra this morningINS Shikra formerly known as INS Kunjali is a naval air station located at Colaba in south MumbaiStaterun Oil and Natural Gas Corporation ONGC had on Monday said barge P305 with 261 personnel deployed for offshore drilling got deanchored and began drifting because of the cyclonic storm TauktaeAlso Read Cyclone Tauktae Gymkhanas in Mumbai are now swimkhanasP305 being an accommodation barge had no engine to power it and it hit an oil rig in the vicinity and there was ingress of water sources saidCycloneTauktaeUpdate on Search And Rescue SAR Ops Barge P305177 personnel rescued so farFirst batch of 3 Rescuees brought in by indiannavy HeloINS Kochi and INS Kolkata along with MV Offshore Energy and MV Ahalya continue efforts in extremely challenging circumstances pictwittercomhgaSC9svOhmdash PIB in Maharashtra PIBMumbai May 18 2021A barge is a long flatbottomed boat either under its power or towed by another An accommodation barge is of shallow draft vessel whose keel is not far below the waterline and is used to accommodate personnel on projects where shore accommodation is not availableOffshore accommodation barges are fully autonomous and used mainly in the oil and gas industriesThe Navy on Tuesday morning also deployed the P8I longrange multimission maritime patrol aircraft to join the search and rescue operations the official saidAnother barge the Gal Constructor with 137 persons onboard has run aground about 48 nautical miles north of Colaba Point he said An Emergency Towing Vessel Water Lily two support vessels and CGS Samrat are in the vicinity for rendering assistance and evacuation of crew he addedINS Talwar has proceeded to assist another oil rig Sagar Bhushan with 101 personnel on board and an accommodation barge SS3 with 196 personnel on board both of which are adrift and presently located about 50 NM South East of Pipavav Port the spokesperson said in a statementThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever