At around 03:15 off Silivri, the ALSU tanker, carrying 2,999 tons of motor oil and sailing from Kocaeli to Aliağa, collided with the Tuğberk İmamoğlu bulk carrier, which was carrying 4,199 tons of coiled steel from İskenderun to Karadeniz Ereğli. The Directorate General of Maritime Affairs announced that the Tuğberk İmamoğlu was believed to have sunk.
The emergency signal received from the COSPAS-SARSAT system at 03:26 was determined to belong to the Tuğberk İmamoğlu. The captain of the ALSU tanker also reported the collision at 03:41. The first maritime search and rescue unit set out for the area at 04:10.
Search and rescue efforts for the ship, which has not responded to calls and whose personnel could not be reached, are being carried out by teams from the Directorate General of Coastal Safety and the Turkish Coast Guard. The operation involves 14 maritime search and rescue units, one helicopter and the ALSU tanker. The lifesaving equipment belonging to the ship, which had 10 seafarers on board, was found on the sea surface, but the personnel could not be located.
Why it matters
The incident has brought both navigational safety and the functioning of the emergency response chain into focus in the Sea of Marmara, where heavy commercial shipping continues. The times at which the emergency signal was received, the tanker captain reported the incident and the search and rescue team was mobilized provide a basic timeline for assessing the response process. Although lifesaving equipment was found, the failure to reach the 10 seafarers shifts the priority of the efforts to determining their location and condition. While the tanker’s carriage of motor oil also requires potential environmental impacts to be monitored separately, no information about any spill has been shared. At the same time, resolving the contradiction pointed out in news reports regarding the cargo situation is necessary for accurately understanding the scale of the accident’s risks.