Vietnamese Freighter Goes Down With 62 Crewmembers Aboard
On Saturday, a small Vietnamese freighter with an unusually large crew complement went down off the Chinese naval base at Fiery Cross Reef, prompting a large-scale rescue effort.
The Khoi Nguyen 18 sent a distress call at about 1830 hours on Saturday, and the signal was picked up by a Chinese rescue vessel. In response, according to state broadcaster Xinhua, six Chinese rescue vessels, a Vietnamese vessel and a rescue helicopter responded to the scene.
The Khoi Nguyen 18 had 62 people on board at the time of the casualty, and 45 had been rescued by late Sunday. Search efforts continue for those still missing.
In a press conference Sunday, a spokesperson for Vietnam's foreign ministry said that the freighter had gone down in severe weather.
"We sincerely appreciate the Chinese relevant forces' swift support for Vietnam's search and rescue efforts and hope both sides will continue to work closely together to locate those who remain missing," the spokesperson said.
Khoi Nguyen 18 was a 230-foot, 1,900 dwt general cargo ship flagged in Vietnam - a very small coastal freighter. Built in 2017 and originally held by a leasing company, she was reported sold to an unknown owner in 2023, and her current management is not listed in public databases. A vessel of this size would typically have a crew complement of 10-15 people, with liferaft inventory and berthing capacity arranged accordingly.
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She had spent much of the past year running AIS-dark, except for periodic port calls at Cam Ranh, and not been observed on AIS since March. Her heading on most departures from Can Ranh had been towards the central Spratly Islands, but in each instance her AIS transmission ceased shortly after leaving port.
The Spratly Islands have no meaningful commercial opportunities for civilian freight transport, but see considerable activity in the form of national-security basing and fortification projects. In addition to Chinese mega-bases like Fiery Cross Reef, Vietnam operates its own island outposts in the Spratly archipelago, and has been actively expanding through land reclamation and construction at a dozen sites - notably a giant dredging and infill project at Barque Canada Reef. Some of these bases, like Alison Reef, are in the general vicinity of Fiery Cross Reef and the area of the sinking.
