Crew rescued by cutting hole in hull

The 160-metre motor vessel Rocknes capsized off Bergen on Monday evening with 30 crew. Only twelve survived.

Rocknes was being towed into shallow waters when rescuers head tapping from inside the hull.

Captain Malvin Solberg of the rescue vessel “Flekkeroey” said. “We had factory drawings and found that the people knocking had to be in the engine room. When made a 10-millimeter observation hole air flowed out and a small piece of paper was passed to us from the people inside.”

“Then a square of 60 by 60 centimetres was cut almost through, but not completely. The square was fastened to a crane.

“On a given signal, three rescuers cut through the remaining part, and the crane removed the square.”

The captain said that as they were working, the water inside the ship “rose so high that there was only one meter of air left.”

The three Filipino survivors were “more or less shot out of the wreck because of the enormous air pressure inside.”

Norwegian authorities have not yet determined the cause of the accident.

Rocknes was bound for Germany, carrying rocks to be used as foundation for underwater cables. She was carrying 24 Filipino crewmen, a German, two Norwegians and three Dutch nationals.