Search operations for the young Egyptian sailor, Sameh Sayed al-Masry, who went missing in the Indian Ocean, is still underway, in cooperation with the security authorities in Egypt and abroad, to identify his fate, an official source with the Ministry of Immigration said.
Survivors confirmed his fall into the water, without being sure of his rescue or whether he was dead or alive the source said.
Sayed, who graduated from the Jordan Academy for Maritime Studies, this year, went out to work on a Syrian commercial boat, bound for Libya, with a team of 12 sailors, but after the boat was launched into the ocean, the sailors’ crew discovered defects in the boat which resulted in water leaks.
Sayed sent videos of the leak from inside the boat to a friend and to his mother.
At the same time the Jordan Academy of Maritime Studies stated that a ship sank in the Indian Ocean after the evacuation of its entire crew.
Mostafa Tariq, Sayed’s friend, posted on his personal page on Facebook that Sameh was among the 12-member marine crew, and that on July 14 the boat sank in the middle of the ocean.
The crew moved to a small boat, and sent mayday signals to the nearest ship which was 12 hours away.
But after the crew moved to the small boat, Sayed fell off the boat, along with another person named Mohamed Gamal.
Sailor Amr Ismail, who was on board the sunken ship, said that the crew on board the sinking boat included six Egyptians, five Syrians, and the captain, adding that their journey had begun since February 15, when they headed from Cairo Airport to Japan to receive the ship, on March 1.
He added they took the ship and headed to Korea and then China, where cobalt-iron was shipped and delivered to the Libyan port of Misurata.
He pointed out that the owner of the boat was with them, but he went to Sri Lanka.
Ismail pointed out, in press statements, that the ship had many defects at the beginning of the journey, which prompted the captain on his journey from Sri Lanka to stop in the Maldives, where the ship was admitted to the repair shop.
The incident prompted him and another colleague to get off the boat, and two others were hired, Ismail said.
Amira Sayed, sister of the missing Egyptian sailor, recounted the details of her last conversation with her brother before they lost connection with him.
She said, during a telephone interview to the “Yahdoth Fi Masr” (Happening in Egypt) program broadcast on MBC Masr that her brother had been talking to her about what was happening inside the ship since last May.
“I contacted Sameh for the last time only 20 days ago,” she said.
During the last call, she said her brother told her that he was moving from the Maldives to Libya, and that he would pass through the Suez Canal.
“He told me about the ship’s situation in detail, and sent me messages and pictures showing the boat’s deterioration,” she added.
“He told me: that just in case something happens to me, you get my rights,” she said, adding, “One of my brother’s friends contacted me and informed me of what happened, saying: “The waves took your brother.”
