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Cargo Ship Off Georgia Coast Rolls; 4 Crew Members Still Missing

   DailyWire.com
A Cosco France container ship berths with the help of tugboats at the Port of Ningbo-Zhoushan on September 1, 2019 in Zhoushan, Zhejiang Province of China.
Photo by Yao Feng/VCG via Getty Images

At around 2 a.m. local time on Sunday, authorities were made aware that a cargo ship had started to lean into the water on its way to possibly capsizing in St. Simons Sound, off the coast of Georgia, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.

After departing port, and attempting to make a starboard turn, the ship, called the Golden Ray, began to tilt toward its port side. 20 of the 24 crew members on board the ship have been rescued, but dangerous conditions forced officials to halt the ongoing operation.

During a press briefing concerning the incident, Captain John Reed, commander of Coast Guard Sector Charleston, spoke about the rescue effort being undertaken:

Coast Guard crews along with partner agencies and commercial assistance providers, as well as South Carolina Department of Natural Resources and Moran Towing, made several rescues from the vessel at multiple points. 20 of the 24 people on board have been rescued at this time. As smoke and flames began to appear, our crews along with the Glynn County heavy rescue team assessed that the situation was too risky to further go inside the vessel to attempt to locate the four individuals who remain missing at this time.

We are working with the salvers, Coast Guard Salvage Engineering Response team, the surveyor, and the company to stabilize the vessel. Once salvage professionals have determined the vessel to be stable, we will identify the best option to continue our rescue efforts for the four crew members who remain on board.

The Coast Guard’s Marine Safety Unit (MSU) Savannah Commander Norm Witt stated that in addition to the rescue efforts, actions had been taken to “mitigate” the potential dispersion of pollutants into the water.

The Georgia Department of Public Health posted a tweet warning swimmers to stay out of the water due to potential contaminants:

We’ve issued a precautionary swimming advisory for #SaintSimons and #JekyllIsland beaches after a cargo ship capsized in the St. Simons Sound. @CoastalGADNR will conduct water quality sampling; until the testing is complete, we advise against swimming or wading in the water.

When a reporter asked if this would be a “recovery or a rescue,” an official at the press briefing noted that it was a “complex situation,” but continued to refer to the operation as a “rescue,” seeming to indicate a belief that the four remaining crew members are still alive.

Regarding why the ship began to capsize in the first place, Commander Witt stated that it was an “ongoing investigation.”

At 5:22 p.m., the Coast Guard Southeast Twitter account released a video of the earlier rescue operation:

The most recent tweet, from approximately 6:55 p.m., reads: “A damage assessment team from the @USCG Atlantic Strike Team prepares to depart from #USCG Station Brunswick. The team is assessing the impacts of the Golden Ray and are just one of many specialized teams working diligently in the complex response.”

As of publication, the four missing crew members have not been rescued or recovered.

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