20 SAILORS MISSING IN SEA NEAR PHILIPPINES

MANILA, Philippines – Coast guard spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Algier Ricafrente says the Hong Kong Maritime Rescue Coordinating Center reported late on Friday that it had received a distress call from the MV Oceanic Union off Ilocos Norte province.
He says the ship may have sunk or was sinking since the crew had already abandoned ship.
Meanwhile, The Philippine navy and coast guard are searching for 20 crew members of a cargo ship that may have sunk in rough waters west of the main island of Luzon.
A navy vessel and a coast guard vessel, helicopter and airplane are scouring the waters about 160 kilometres west of Burgos township.
Other ships passing through the area have been notified. The Panamanian-registered ship was heading to Subic Bay west of Manila from Shanghai.
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MUSCAT, Oman - Reporting on the same isu, five Indian sailors drowned, nine are still missing and six were rescued by the Omani Coast Guards and Naval vessels after their boat sank off Oman’s southern coast on Saturday.
“Five bodies have been spotted on the surface of the sea and coast guards have gone to pick the bodies,” a source from Sadah Hospital, where the rescued sailors were taken for treatment, told Gulf News over the phone.
The nine missing sailors on board MSV Shiv Sagar MNV 2169, which sank off Oman’s southern coast near Sadah, are Captain Prabhulal, Engineer Suresh, Lalji, Bharat, Mohan Mehta, Ashraf Asam, Yusuf Saamra, Suleiman Haji Sumara and Hussain Sumaraa.
The rescued sailors are currently being kept at the police station in Sadah, located around 140km from Salalah in southern Oman.