An aid ship carrying emergencyrelief supplies to war-stricken Liberia sank off neighbouringSierra Leone at the weekend but the crew managed to swim ashore,aid workers said today.
Mr Rich Moseanko, spokesman for US-based aid organisationWorld Vision, said the
Madame Patricia
was carrying $86,000worth of relief supplies when it ran into problems in a stormshortly after leaving Sierra Leone's capital Freetown.
"It was a ship chartered to transport relief items fromFreetown. It went down in a storm some time after Saturdaynight," Mr Moseanko told reporters in the Liberian capital Monrovia.
The crew of 20 plus two people working for the company whosupplied the goods eventually abandoned the ship and swamashore, Mr Moseanko said.
The aid lost on board included blankets, sleeping mats,water containers and power generators. Mr Moseanko said he believedthe ship was owned by a Sierra Leonean company, but could notgive further details.
Mr Moseanko said the brother of one of those on board began toworry about the ship and hired a helicopter to mount a search,eventually finding the 22 on the Atlantic shore.
More than 1,000 Nigerian-led regional peacekeepers backed byUS Marines are in the process of securing Liberia's shatteredcapital Monrovia, split in two for weeks by fighting betweengovernment and rebel troops.
Aid organisations, some of whom lost stocks of food andother supplies in an orgy of looting in Monrovia, are trying tohelp hundreds of thousands of displaced people in the city.
Various aid agencies have ships in the region on standby totransport emergency aid to Monrovia after rebels handed over theport area to regional peacekeepers last week.
But aid workers say widespread looting of equipment andsupplies at the port is hampering unloading.