Busan Coast Guard raided the South Korean shipping company Polaris Shipping on May 25th, reported Yonhap. The investigation relates to the sinking of VLOC Stellar Daisy in the South Atlantic at the end of March.
The investigation is into how Polaris operated the vessel and also into the alleged “slow reaction” to distress calls sent from the ship at the time of the sinking. The 1993-built ship was carrying eight South Korean and sixteen Filipino sailors, with only two being rescued. The vessel appears to have split in half after a hull crack resulted in water ingress, causing liquefaction of the ore and a shift in cargoer. No official cause of the incident has been provided.
After small cracks were found in the hulls of two other vessels (one of them not a conversion), the company launched a fleet-wide inspection of its ships.