Ten crew died and another 10 are missing and presumed dead, following a fire that broke out on two ships while they were transferring fuel in the Kerch Strait, Black Sea Monday, according to data provided by Russia’s Transport Ministry.
The vessels involved are reportedly the Tanzanian-flagged LPG tankers ‘Venice’ and ‘Maestro’. These are the same names with two Tanzania-flagged ships, which last year were included on a US sanctions advisory as delivering fuel to Syria, Reuters reported.
A total of 32 crewmen were onboard at the time of the incident. Forces rescued 12 people from the burning vessels, but there was little hope of finding any more survivors. As such, the focus has switched from a rescue operation to a search for bodies, a spokesman for the Transport Ministry’s maritime unit told Reuters.
The vessels are still on fire and attempts to extinguish the blaze are obstructed due to heavy seas.
The accident seems to have not affected traffic through Kerch Strait so far.
AIS data indicates that both vessels were operating in the Black Sea region in the last month.
In November 2018, the US Treasury Department added nine Russian and Iranian individuals and companies on its sanctions list for participating in the shipment of petroleum to Syria. Along with this, it issued an advisory note warning of the potential sanctions risk for any entities involved in such shipments which listed 35 ships, including the Maestro and Venice, as having delivered oil to Syria between 2016 and 2018.
Reuters reported in December that both the Maestro and Venice continued operations after the Treasury announcement, and regularly entered Crimea’s Temryuk port, according to Refinitiv data.
