{"id":2199892,"date":"2026-10-15T08:22:47","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T05:22:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2199892"},"modified":"2026-10-15T08:22:47","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T05:22:47","slug":"eight-crew-missing-in-tanker-fire-off-romanias-coast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2199892","title":{"rendered":"Eight crew missing in tanker fire off Romania’s coast"},"content":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/f4d3\/live\/d5ccaca0-c877-11f1-934d-bbdb5e261215.png”]<\/p>\n

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\"RomanianRomanian Interior Ministry<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
A search and rescue operation involving boats and helicopters is now continuing in rough seas, Romania’s authorities say<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Eight of 12 crew members are missing after a tanker caught fire off Romania’s coast, naval authorities say, and there are reports of explosions on board.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The San Marino-flagged Wine Trader was 13 nautical miles (24km) east of the mouth of the River Danube at Sulina, when it reported blasts and a fire on Thursday morning. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The west coast of the Black Sea has recently seen a spate of drone attacks, and reports from nearby ships say the tanker was hit by two drones. Russian drones were detected overnight not far from the scene – near Ukraine’s Snake Island.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Russia said two cargo ships with military cargo heading to Ukraine’s Odesa port were hit during the sea crossing. It did not name the vessels.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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On Tuesday, two merchant ships were struck by drones further south along the coast of Bulgaria, Romania’s neighbour, and one of the vessels sank leaving 11 crew members missing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Bulgaria said it suspected Russia was behind that attack, summoning the country’s envoy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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A search and rescue operation for the eight missing members of the Wine Trader continues, Romania’s authorities have said. Two Black Hawk helicopters and two rescue boats have been deployed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The Romanian interior ministry has released a video showing one of the helicopters hovering above the vessel.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The priority is now to reach the four crew members confirmed to be alive, while ensuring the safety of rescue teams with very high waves reported in the area.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The tanker, which was sailing from Tunisia to Romania, reported several explosions on board at about 07:00 local time (05:00 GMT).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The presidents of Romania and Bulgaria are due to discuss today whether Article 4 of the Nato treaty should be invoked. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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This allows any member of the military alliance to request consultations with its allies if it believes its territorial integrity or security is threatened.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Ukraine has directly blamed Russia for earlier attacks on civilian vessels in the western side of the Black Sea – a key route for Ukrainian exports and imports. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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On Tuesday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen spoke of the Black Sea becoming “another front of escalation of the Russian war in Ukraine. This is unacceptable”.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Russia’s military has recently intensified its strikes on vessels in the area, as part of its war against Ukraine.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Last week, another two ships were struck off Bulgaria, and on the same day Ukraine hit an oil tanker in the Russian Black Sea port of Sochi.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Moscow says it is targeting ships delivering weapons and dual-use cargo to Ukrainian ports. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Kyiv and its European allies say merchant vessels carrying grain and other civilian cargo are being attacked.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Both Russia and Ukraine are major grain-exporting countries and Turkey has called on both countries to halt attacks in the Black Sea.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Moscow has repeatedly rejected calls by the US and Europe for a naval ceasefire in the Black Sea, blaming Ukraine for attacking Russian merchant ships in the area.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and Moscow currently controls about 20% of Ukrainian territory.<\/b><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

[analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/articles\/c60qkgpp592yo”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/f4d3\/live\/d5ccaca0-c877-11f1-934d-bbdb5e261215.png”] Romanian Interior Ministry A search and rescue operation involving boats and helicopters is now continuing in rough seas, Romania’s authorities say Eight of 12 crew members are missing after a tanker caught fire off Romania’s coast, naval authorities say, and there are reports of explosions on board. The San Marino-flagged Wine Trader […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[35,226],"class_list":["post-2199892","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-bbc-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199892","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2199892"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199892\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2199892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2199892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2199892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}