On the morning of July 21, Mr. Le Van Linh (born in 1984, residing in Thien Cam commune, Ha Tinh province) said that on the evening of July 19, he and 3 other crew members used a boat with a capacity of more than 300 horsepower to fish in Thien Cam sea.
At around 8:00 p.m. the same day, the sea of Thien Cam suddenly had strong winds, feeling like a thunderstorm was coming, so Mr. Linh and 3 crew members quickly moved the boat to shore for shelter.
While on his way to shore, at around 10pm, at a location about 0.5 nautical miles from Thien Cam coast, Mr. Linh discovered the Nguyen Ngoc tourist boat in distress, many people on the boat shouted for help.
Mr. Linh shared that at first he was wondering what would happen if he had saved people, if unfortunately his boat had an accident. However, in a moment, he decided to turn around and participate in saving people.
"My salary does not allow me to ignore when I see someone in trouble. Therefore, I quickly decided to take advantage of the danger and return to save people immediately," Mr. Linh shared.
When approaching the tourist boat in distress, Mr. Linh and 3 crew members used a basket boat (small round boat) to carry on their boat to approach and rescue them, taking each person onto their large boat.
"When I was able to move the tourists to my boat, the tourist boat gradually sank and overturned into the sea. Thinking back, fortunately I acted in time, if I were a few minutes late, many people would be in danger of their lives, said Mr. Linh.
After rescuing the tourists, due to strong waves and danger, they could not reach the shore, so Mr. Linh moved the boat to nearby Boc Island for shelter.
At around 1:00 a.m. on July 20, when the storm had passed and the sea was calm, Mr. Linh and his 3 crew members had just carried the people in distress to shore safely.
According to Mr. Linh, there were 30 people on the sunken tourist boat, his boat rescued 26 people, the remaining 4 people were rescued by another boat. All are safe when brought to shore.
Mr. Nguyen Trong Hoang - owner of the Nguyen Ngoc tourist boat that sank in Thien Cam sea - said that at around 5:00 p.m. on July 19, his tourist boat carrying 27 passengers and 3 crew members went fishing in Thien Cam sea about 600m from shore.
At around 8:30 p.m., while tourists were fishing, the wind started to strengthen, and thunderstorms appeared.
The waves hit hard, water overflowed into the ship's hold, unable to hold on. At this time, everyone on the boat was equipped with life jackets, ready for bad situations when they had to jump into the sea.
The boat owner contacted the border guards and fishermen's fishing boats for help. Among them, there was a ship of Mr. Linh participating in the rescue.
On the morning of July 21, Mr. Vo Ta Nhan - Chairman of the People's Committee of Thien Cam commune - said that the incident of the Nguyen Ngoc tourist boat sinking at sea on the evening of July 19 was fortunate that the authorities and many local fishermen participated in the rescue in time.
"We highly appreciate the efforts to save people of many local fishermen, including Mr. Linh's boat. That night, we also directly received encouragement and thanked the people for being proactive, despite the danger, participating in saving people, Mr. Nhan shared.
