Explosion kills four on Cyprus ship

By Jean Christou

THE MERCHANT Shipping Department (MSD) yesterday defended the standard of a Cyprus-flagged ship on which four Polish sailors were killed in an explosion on Monday.

Andreas Constantinou, senior surveyor at the Department, said yesterday that the ship, the Athenian Fidelity, had been registered under the Cyprus flag in 1985.

“It was one of the first new ships in our fleet and remains under the same management and ownership and crewing,” he said.

The Greek-owned Athenian Fidelity was manned by 31 Polish crew members, a number “well above the requirements”, he said.

Five of the crew were killed and three injured in the explosion aboard the tanker on Monday, 100 miles southwest of Puerto Rico as the ship headed from New York to Punta Cardon. It was in ballast at the time.

Lloyds List said yesterday the five men had been on deck at the time of the explosion.

The three injured men were airlifted from the vessel by US coastguard helicopter and taken to San Juan Medical centre. Two are in a serious condition, Lloyds said.

The ship was proceeding to the Dominican Republic, where it will stay at least until Sunday, Constantinou told the Cyprus Mail.

The MSD had planned to send its experts to New York earlier this week to meet up with the Athenian Fidelity at its next port of call, but Constantinou said this would not now be possible because there had been some difficulty in securing a visa for the Dominican Republic.

“We have instructed our marine attaché in New York to proceed to Puerto Rico to interview the injured crew members,” Constantinou said. “But we are not sure because of their condition whether they will be able to talk.”

Constantinou said there was no indication so far of what might have caused the explosion.

Lloyds said the vessel had had an intermediate survey in december 1997, had been approved since then by major oil companies Shell, Mobil, and Texaco and has successfully undergone a tank vessel examination by the US coastguard. It has never been detained.

The accident is the second on a vessel operated by the Greek Intestra company in less than a week.

Last week, an explosion occurred aboard the Athenian Pride, shortly before it completed a ship-to-ship transfer of crude oil. No one was killed.

Constantinou said there was no connection between the two explosions aboard sister ships.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.