PORT ELIZABETH, August 13 (ANA) – A seriously injured sailor has been evacuated from a ship off Port Elizabeth and admitted to hospital in the city, the National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI) said on Saturday.
NSRI Port Elizabeth deputy station commander Justin Erasmus said duty crew launched the sea rescue craft Eikos Rescuer IV, accompanied by a Relay ambulance services paramedic, just after 1.30pm on Friday to rendezvous with the bulk carrier MV Arabella seven nautical miles northeast of Port Elizabeth to evacuate a 35-year-old Filipino sailor who suffered back and leg injuries in a fall down stairs earlier in the day.
The motor vessel, sailing from Mombasa in Kenya to Corpus Christi in Texas in the US, reported the injury to the Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre (MRCC). A government health emergency medical services (EMS) duty doctor evaluated the injury by radio telephone and provided medical treatment advice, and the vessel was requested to head towards the nearest port, Port Elizabeth.
The sea rescue craft arrived on the scene at 2pm in choppy seas with a 25 knot gusting southwesterly wind. The patient was stabilised and secured into a stokes basket stretcher and transferred onto the sea rescue craft. He was brought to the NSRI base in the harbour, from where he was taken to hospital in a stable condition by an East Cape government health EMS ambulance. The MV Arabella had continued on her voyage, Erasmus said.
– African News Agency (ANA)
