crew member has been killed and several others injured after a fire broke out on a cargo ship carrying nearly 3,000 cars in the North Sea.
An electric car is believed to have caused the inferno, which broke out on Tuesday night and forced several crew members to jump overboard, the Dutch coast guard said.
Boats and helicopters were used to rescue crew members from the vessel early on Wednesday after they tried unsuccessfully to put out the blaze, the coast guard said in a statement.
Panama-registered vehicle carrier Fremantle Highway was transporting 2,857 cars – 25 of them electric – from Germany to Port Said in Egypt.
A crew member of the Fremantle Highway freighter is brought ashore in Lauwersoog, the Netherlands
/ ANP/AFP via Getty ImagesThe ship was sailing 27 km (17 miles) north of the Dutch island of Ameland, off the northern tip of the Netherlands, with 23 crew onboard when the fire started on Tuesday night, a coastguard statement said.
The crew had tried, but failed, to extinguish the fire.
Injured crew members were taken by helicopter to medical facilities on the mainland. They suffered smoke inhalation, or were hurt during the evacuation.
An electric car was the suspected source of the blaze, a coastguard spokesperson said on Wednesday morning, as the ship continued to burn.
Footage and images taken from shore on Wednesday showed a long plume of grey smoke drifting over the sea from the stricken ship.
The 199-metre vessel was successfully towed out of shipping lanes early on Wednesday, Dutch broadcaster NOS reported.
A spokesperson for Shoei Kisen Kaisha, a Japanese ship leasing company that manages the Fremantle Highway, was not immediately available for comment.
It is the latest fire to hit a car carrier.
Earlier this month, two New Jersey firefighters were killed and five injured while battling an intense blaze on a cargo ship carrying hundreds of vehicles. A fire destroyed thousands of luxury cars on a ship off the coast of Portugal’s Azores islands in February last year.