A young survivor says he can still see the leaping flames and dense smoke that engulfed his ship, the first vessel struck by an Iranian drone, the morning after the war began on February 28.
Sunil Pooniya is among eight crew who survived a drone strike on Skylight, a Palau-flagged tanker on March 1 off Oman’s Khasab port that killed the captain and a sailor.
A total of 11 seafarers have been killed in 38 attacks on vessels in the Arabian Gulf and around the Strait of Hormuz, with about 20,000 seafarers stranded in 1,600 vessels in the Gulf waters, according to International Maritime Organisation figures.
Three months after the attack, Mr Pooniya, 26, is haunted by the fire that ripped through the engine room and accommodation killing his friend Dalip Singh, 25, after two drones hit the tanker in rapid succession.
“Any loud sound I hear now, in my mind I can only see my ship and think of my friend. That day, at 7.05am, I heard a frightening explosion and ran out of my room. The flames were already high but I managed to escape. Then 10-15 seconds later, there was another explosion. We realised later the engine room was hit, that’s why there was such a big blast,” Mr Pooniya told The National from India’s western Rajasthan state.
“My friend Dalip was on duty in the engine room. I can’t forget the loud blast and see the flames that killed my friend. There was too much fire and smoke.”
Videos filmed by the crew show smoke billowing minutes after the attack with seamen yelling out each other’s names and shouts of “Captain sir, captain sir, where is captain?” The photos capture the ship’s charred exterior and large sections blasted open in the explosion.
Mr Pooniya’s first-hand account of the crew’s ordeal puts into focus the dangers that sailors face every day the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz continues.
Normally about a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas transits the waterway with about 130 or more ships passing through daily before the war.
Fight to survive
Both Mr Pooniya and Mr Singh were assistant oilers who worked in the engine room, recorded the temperature, pressure of fuel and oil levels and monitored the performance of the machinery. They grew up in the same village Bamna with their homes four kilometres apart.
There were 22 men on board Skylight, of which 10 were Indian crew and 12 were Iranians on board for a few days to clean the diesel fuel tank. The tanker was empty and anchored in the Musandam governorate waiting to be reloaded.
Mr Pooniya had completed the night shift and handed over to Mr Singh at 4am. When the ship was hit, Mr Pooniya escaped to the deck and saw some men trapped in the accommodation area that was filling up with smoke. The crew threw up ropes to bring the men down to safety.
“There was fire on the stairs so we used ropes to get them out. We called out for the captain and my friend but they never came out,” Mr Pooniya said.
“When we saw the damage, we realised my friend had died on the spot. The drone hit the engine room and he was inside. It was not possible for anyone to come out of that alive. The captain was declared missing, they later found his body in his room – he too could not escape.”
He says 12 men survived because the second drone missed its target.
“We are lucky to be alive. If the second drone directly hit the ship, no one would have survived,” he said. “The ship moved due to the impact of the first drone hit, so the second drone only partially skimmed the ship and fell into the sea.”
The Oman Navy sent boats to evacuate the survivors. “The rescue boats stopped at a distance as they were worried the tanker would explode. So we wore life jackets, jumped in to the sea and swam to the boats,” Mr Pooniya said.
The men initially thought it was a generator blast and later learnt from senior crew that war had broken out around them.
It was the first voyage for Mr Pooniya, a former garment salesman who took to the sea to earn more for his family. The crew has received their salary but has yet to obtain compensation from the shipping company.
Despite the trauma, he hoped to return to the sea that is his only route to settle thousands of dollars in loans he took to secure the job.
“I have sailed only for 37 days and my family is too scared to let me go back,” he said. “I’m selling garments again for now. I lost all my belongings and documents. I need to go back to sailing because I need to do something for my family. But the next time I will do a proper background check on the shipping company, find out their safety record, how they treat crew,” he added.
“We were saved by God, we can still earn for our families but what about those who died? My friend was the only earning member and his family is devastated with grief.”
Reeling with sorrow
The family of Dalip Singh spoke of their intense sadness and how his father died from a heart attack less than a month after Mr Singh’s death.
“It’s too much to bear. We spoke to my brother on February 28 evening and then got news that he was first missing, then were told the next morning he was dead,” said Manoj Singh, Dalip’s younger brother.
“Our last phone call was just normal family conversation. We did not believe it, we still cannot believe it. This was only Dalip’s second sailing. My father died because of the tension. My mother is in and out of hospital, she cannot cope with life without Dalip.”
The family have received compensation of one million Indian rupees (Dh38,000 or $10,400) from India’s Directorate General of Shipping but had yet to receive funds from the shipping company. Skylight’s owner is Sea Force Inc and it is managed by Red Sea Ship Management. Both could not be reached for comment.
With a seafarer workforce of more than 300,000, India is among the world’s top three suppliers of sailors after the Philippines and China, according to government figures.
The Indian government says it has helped bring home safely more than 3,200 sailors from the Gulf region.
India’s Directorate of Shipping has advised round-the-clock surveillance to guard against “evolving asymmetric threats of drone attacks, missile strikes and small craft-based attacks targeting merchant vessels operating in the region.”
Safety of sailors
Tens of thousands of seafarers remain stranded due to the blockade in the Strait of Hormuz.
Arsenio Dominguez, IMO secretary general, has repeatedly called for a halt on attacks on commercial vessels.
He has relayed conversations with sailors who spoke of limited food supplies and being fearful of being hit by debris as they watch missile and drone interceptions nearby.
“The attacks and seizures of commercial ships are unacceptable. I once again call for these reckless actions to cease and for any ships and innocent crew to be released immediately,” he said in a recent statement.
Describing the stranded crew as innocent people doing their jobs for the benefit of all, he has spoken of the toll on mental health, urged prioritising their safety and the need “to keep highlighting how relevant seafarers are but how forgotten they tend to be”.
