Coast Guard launches search operations to locate fishermen

Kozhikode, May 31 (UNI) The Indian Coast Guard (ICG) today launched search operations to locate 16 fishermen, who went missing while fishing in deep sea few days ago, sources said.

They have not been traced so far despite search operations carried out by a helicopter and two vessels ICG Commandant Jasbir Singh told UNI here today.

He said, the six-wing Dornier helicopter from Cochin and two Fast Patrol Vessels, one each from Mangalore and Cochin, were pressed into service on reports from Fisheries Department (FD) that the men who went on two boats for fishing from Beypore between May 24 and 26 could not be contacted so far.

He said the chopper returned after search operations at 200 nautical miles from the shore because of poor visibility and bad weather.

The patrol vessels, which also failed to locate the boats because of high swell and waves, would be pressed into service again.

The FD sources, said workers of another boat on a similar job saw them fishing in the deep sea a few days ago. However they could not be contacted either through wireless or mobile phone.

Meanwhile, the district administration today set up two more relief camps, apart from the existing five, for housing people shifted from low lying areas as torrential rains continued to wreak havoc on the coastal district.

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