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Search Mission News

13 Apr 2022

The New 'New York'

(Photo: Sandy Hook Pilots Association)

When it came time to replace their 50-year-old station vessel New York, the Sandy Hook Pilots Association thought long and hard, weighing their options to determine the best possible solution. They traveled the country, to Houston, San Francisco and up to the Columbia River, and even to Europe—the Elbe River in Germany and Rotterdam in the Netherlands—to ride with other pilots in search of an answer.“We looked at everything from SWATH (small-waterplane-area twin hull) boats to helicopters to big boats in Europe…

04 Aug 2016

New Mission Set to Retrieve El Faro's VDR

El Faro's voyage data recorder next to the ship's mast on ocean floor (Photo: NTSB)

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) will launch its third mission to the wreckage of the El Faro on Friday from Virginia Beach, Virginia. The mission’s primary objective is to retrieve the sunken cargo ship’s voyage data recorder. The Military Sealift Command’s fleet ocean tug USNS Apache is expected to arrive at the accident site around August 9. Along with the NTSB, the U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. Navy, and Phoenix International are joining the recovery effort, using CURV-21…

06 Jun 2016

Investigators Set Mission to Recover El Faro’s VDR

El Faro's voyage data recorder next to the ship's mast on ocean floor (Photo: NTSB)

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it is set to launch a mission to recover the voyage data recorder (VDR) of sunken cargo ship El Faro. The VDR, belonging to U.S. flagged El Faro which sank during Hurricane Joaquin last October, was located April 26 in about 15,000 feet of water near the Bahamas. The El Faro wreckage was positively identified on November 1, 2015, during the NTSB’s initial mission to locate the wreckage. Video gained from remotely operated…

27 Apr 2016

Another Mission Needed to Recover El Faro’s VDR

Voyage data recorder next to El Faro's mast on ocean floor (Photo: NTSB)

The investigative team who located the El Faro’s voyage data recorder (VDR) has determined that another mission will be necessary in order to retrieve the device, which may contain recorded conversations and sounds from the ship’s navigation bridge, potentially helping investigators to piece together the sequence of events that led to the cargo ship’s sinking during Hurricane Joaquin in October 2015. The team of investigators and scientists aboard research vessel Atlantis collaborated…

11 Feb 2016

NTSB to Search for El Faro’s Voyage Data Recorder

EL Faro sits in 15,000 feet of water near the Bahamas (Photo: NTSB)

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it will initiate a second search expedition to the wreckage of sunken El Faro in an effort to gather further evidence in its investigation of the loss of the containership, which sank in the Atlantic during Hurricane Joaquin on October 1, 2015. A key objective of the mission, which is expected to begin in April and last about two weeks, is to locate the voyage data recorder (VDR) and to provide investigators with a more extensive and detailed survey of the shipwreck, NTSB said, adding the exact launch date will be announced later.

23 Jun 2015

200 Migrants Rescued off Libyan Coast

A refined product tanker owned by Danish shipping company Torm rescued more than 200 migrants off the coast of Libya on Sunday and took them to Italy at the request of the Italian coastguard, the company said. The tanker picked up 222 migrants from two distressed boats off Zawiya, a coastal region west of Tripoli, and deposited them at Port Reggio Calabria, on the southern tip of mainland Italy, on Monday, the company said. Migrant rescues by commercial boats are increasingly common in Mediterranean waters as more and more people leaving the Middle East and Africa try to cross the Mediterranean to Europe this year, often on unsafe vessels. Just under 2,000 migrants have died trying to make the crossing in boats so far this year, compared to about 425 in the same period a year ago.

22 Jun 2015

600 Med Migrants Rescued

A Norwegian ship rescued more than 600 migrants from two wooden boats on Monday in the southern part of the Mediterranean, the Norwegian police said on Twitter. All migrants picked by the ship, the Siem Pilot, were healthy, including several pregnant women, the Norwegian authorities said.   Thousands of migrants fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East have died trying to cross the Mediterranean, mostly heading for Italy. European Union leaders agreed in April to boost naval search mission in the Mediterranean after a boat sank and as many as 900 migrants died off the coast of Libya. The Siem Pilot is part of the EU's operation off Italy. It was originally built to supply oil platforms in the North Sea. Reporting by Nerijus Adomaitis

24 Apr 2015

Fifty Mali Migrants Among Hundred Drowned in Med

At least 50 Malians from the impoverished region of Kayes were among up to 900 migrants who drowned trying to cross from Libya to Europe this weekend, the government said on Friday. The deaths triggered worldwide outrage and prompted the European Union to agree to triple the size of its naval search mission in the Mediterranean at a hastily convened summit. "There were 24 survivors amongst which there were 12 Malians. Around 50 Malians drowned but that number could increase," said Kany Keita, spokesman for the Ministry for Malians Abroad. Nearly 2,000 people have died this year out of nearly 40,000 people recorded making the crossing. The Kayes region of western Mali, which borders Senegal, Guinea and Mauritania, has seen high levels of emigration for years.

24 Apr 2015

UN Cautiously Optimistic with EU Migrant Plan

The United Nations refugee agency said on Friday the European Union's plan to triple its naval search mission in the Mediterranean for migrants was an "important first step towards collective European action." In a statement issued in Geneva, the UNHCR called on the EU to focus on saving lives and facilitating access to protection in Europe through other legal channels. "Ultimately the test will be whether we see reduction in lives lost, effective access to protection in Europe without having to cross the Mediterranean, and an effective Common European Asylum System, which truly lives up to its commitments of solidarity and responsibility-sharing," the agency said, a day after EU leaders agreed the plan in Brussels.

06 Apr 2011

WHOI-led Team Locates Air France Wreckage

A search team led by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) has located the wreckage of Air France Flight 447 some 3,900 meters, or nearly 2.5 miles, below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean off Brazil’s northeastern coast. The team left the port of Suape, Brazil, aboard the vessel Alucia on March 22, arriving at the search site on March 25. After one week of searching, one of the mission’s three autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), the REMUS 6000s, detected debris on the seafloor. A second vehicle was dispatched to the area for more detailed sonar mapping and photographic imaging.