Crew rescued from sunk fishing boat off Pengjia

A Taiwan-registered fishing boat crew was rescued after their vessel sank off Pengjia Islet following a cabin fire, according to Taiwan’s Coast Guard Administration (CGA). All six crew members—Captain Lin (Taiwan) and five Filipino crewmen—spent nearly 10 hours adrift in a life raft. The CGA said it received a report at about 3 a.m. that the Keelung-registered Yung Fu No. 188 caught fire in the cabin roughly 50 nautical miles (92.6 km) northeast of Pengjia Islet. Coast guard patrol personnel arrived around 4 a.m., found the boat still burning with thick smoke, located the life raft, and brought all six aboard safely. The vessel sank at about 5 a.m. after suffering severe damage and flooding. The preliminary investigation placed the fire’s start around 7 p.m. the previous day; the crew was uninjured, though exhausted. The sunken boat carried about 2 tonnes of fuel, and a fuel slick about 30 m long and 2 m wide was reported; additional patrol assets were dispatched to monitor pollution. The cause remains under investigation.