Missing Ferry Fire Passenger Found Alive Off Corfu

One of the 12 passengers reported missing after a ferry went up in flames near Greece has been found alive.

The Euroferry Olympia vessel, carrying more than 290 passengers and crew, as well as 153 trucks and 32 cars, caught fire on Friday, February 18, between the Greek port of Igoumenitsa and the Italian port of Brindisi. The Greek Coast Guard evacuated around 280 people and took them to the island of Corfu.

While firefighters have been working round the clock to tackle the blaze, with thick smoke still hanging over the vessel and tons of water being poured in, adverse winds and intense temperatures have mostly hindered rescuers' efforts thus far. However, after managing to board the ferry, a 21-year-old Belarusian lorry driver was found alive on the vessel's stern.

The man, who hasn't been named, used a ladder to disembark onto a nearby tugboat. His first words were, 'Tell me I'm alive,' as per The Guardian.

A total of 11 passengers are still missing, said to be from Bulgaria, Greece, Turkey and Lithuania. It's also believed they were sleeping in the cabins of their trucks when the fire broke out on the ferry. The recovery of one of the truckers has raised hopes of finding the others, Greece’s shipping minister Ioannis Plakiotakis said.

Dimitris Karaolanidis, one of the drivers who made it to a lifeboat, said, 'I escaped hell. We heard the alarm, we thought it was some kind of drill. But we saw through the portholes that people were running. You can’t think something at the time [other than] your family... when I hit the deck, I saw smoke and children. Fortunately, they acted quickly.'

David Waller, another trucker, told Reuters, 'It was so unreal, it was a bit like the Titanic, but it was real,' with 'panic and chaos' breaking out amid the flames.

One driver, who hasn't been named, said he thought death had 'come for me... there was so much smoke. I thought we wouldn’t make it. It took us about an hour and a half before we got into the lifeboats and about three more hours before we were picked up'.

The fire is said to have broken out on a third-level car deck, but an investigation has since been ordered into the root of the blaze. The ship’s captain and two engineers were arrested shortly after their initial rescue, but were released the same day.

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