AN official inquiry into the loss of a 16 year old fishermen off the Scottish Coast after his vessel was in collision with a North Sea passenger ferry has formally begun.
The teenager, Daniel McNeill, was fishing with his 20 year old brother on the 14 metre long prawn boat Homeland off the Berwickshire Coast around 8pm on Thursday night when the tragedy happened. The older brother Joseph was picked up relatively unharmed by another fishing boat, but Daniel disappeared . He was spotted for a brief period, but was then lost from view and has not been found despite an intensive air sea search which was called off on Friday evening. The two men lived in the North Shields area and Daniel had only recently left school..
The ferry, Scottish Viking, was on route from Rosyth to Zeebrugge at the time and the owners, the Dutch based Norfolk Line, part of DFDS Seaways, have promised their full co-operation.
The Marine Investigation Branch began a preliminary inquiry at the weekend. Both the branch and many North Sea fishermen will want to know how such a collision could have happened in calm weather conditions and with good visibility - and if anything can be done to avoid such tragedies in future. Large ships are becoming an increasing problem for UK fishermen. These vessels often fail to see the smaller fishing craft. Late last year a Cornish fishermen was lost in the English Channel in similar circumstances when his three man boat was struck by a large container vessel. There have also been a large number of 'near misses."
Meanwhile, late on Friday a Welsh lifeboat crew rescued five people from a sinking fishing boat after getting a mayday call.The Tenby RNLI lifeboat was called to assist the crew of the 30ft fast fishing boat which was six miles south of Penmaen Sands, Oxwich Bay, Swansea.The sinking vessel was just three weeks old.
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