Surveys are continuing on 10,106 teu APL Le Havre (IMO 9461881) in a bid to assess the damage after a container fire tore through the aft of the vessel during the afternoon of August 9th.
The ship was en route from Karachi to Mumbai when a fire was reported in six containers located in the aft section, near the accommodation block.
The ship which was 40nm off Porbandar. She slowed down and turned towards Mundra Port in the Gulf of Kutch, escorted by the Sangram of the Indian Coast Guard, and reached the Gulf of Kutch during the morning of August 10th. The fire was said to be under control. Four containers had been on fire.
Although the Indian Coast Guard was called out the stormy conditions meant that external firefighting was not possible. The APL ship was advised by the coast guard to drill holes in the containers that had caught fire and to flood them with water.
The fire was brought under control after four hours of fire-fighting and was then escorted to Mundra port outer anchorage. No crew were injured during the blaze.
There were 26 crew on board, 14 from Myanmar, eight from Singapore, two Malaysian and two Chinese. 2012-built, Singapore-flagged, 113,735 gt APL Le Havre is owned by Compass Shipping 20 Corp Ltd care of manager APL Co Pte Ltd of Singapore. ISM manager is CMA CGM International Shipping of Singapore. It is entered with North of England Club on behalf of APL Co Pte Ltd.