Paris: One crew member has been found dead and 10 others are still missing after a supply vessel operated by a French oil services group sank in hurricane conditions in the Atlantic, the ship's operator said on Monday.
The Luxembourg-flagged Bourbon Rhode, crewed mainly by Ukrainians, ran into difficulty in the Atlantic late last week as it ran into hurricane Lorenzo, and was later confirmed to have sunk.
A major search operation was then launched for the 14 people who were on board the tug supply vessel. Three crew members who had made their way onto a lifeboat were rescued on Saturday.
The Bourbon Rhode's operator, French marine logistics group Bourbon, which provides services to oil rigs, said one body had now been found but the search was continuing for the other crew members.
"The body of the missing seafarer was located by one of the aircraft involved in the search and has been recovered by one of the five vessels that came to assist," Bourbon said.
"Rescue operations are continuing to find the other crew members, with significant maritime and air search resources deployed by the French and American authorities," it added.
The ship ran close to the eye of the category 4 hurricane some 1,200 nautical miles from the French Caribbean island of Martinique. The Ukrainian foreign ministry said "around 10" of its citizens were missing after the ship sank. "The search operation is ongoing," the ministry official, Vasyl Kyrylych, told AFP by phone.
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