Cargo ship sinks after collision off Istanbul coast, 10 crew missing

A cargo ship has sunk after colliding with another vessel off the coast of Istanbul, Turkiye’s transport minister said, with 10 crew members missing.

The collision took place at 3am (00:00 GMT) in the Marmara Sea a little more than 20 miles (32 kilometres) south of Silivri, a suburb of Turkey’s largest city, the Istanbul governor’s office said in a statement.

Contact was lost with the crew of the Tugberk İmamoglu after the collision with the Turkish-flagged Alsu, which appeared undamaged, the governor’s office said.

A lifeboat and other debris belonging to the cargo ship Tugberk İmamoglu have been found, but there is no sign of the crew of 10, the General Directorate of Maritime Affairs said in a statement.

“It is assessed that the Tugberk İmamoglu vessel sank because it did not respond to any calls and the mobile phones of the personnel on board went unanswered,” the maritime directorate said.

“There are 10 seafarers on board, including the captain,” Transport Minister Abdulkadir Uraloglu said. “They are all Turkish. We can say that the sinking occurred rapidly in 11 minutes. No one has been found alive.”

The 90-metre (295-foot) Tugberk İmamoglu had been sailing from Turkey’s Mediterranean port of Iskenderun to Eregli in the Black Sea. The 91-metre (298-foot) Alsu was sailing from Kocaeli, east of Istanbul, to Aliaga on the Aegean coast, according to the Marine Traffic website.

The Turkish Straits, comprised of the Bosphorus Strait and Dardanelles Strait at either end of the Marmara Sea, are among the busiest shipping lanes in the world, with hundreds of thousands of vessels transiting between the Mediterranean and Black Seas each year.