Ships freed from Baltic Sea ice
Published: 5 Mar 10 13:18 CETDozens of ships have been freed from thick ice in the Baltic Sea on Friday after iuce breakers worked diligently to end the ordeal of of thousands of passengers and crew stranded in freezing conditions off the Swedish coast.
Thousands stuck in Baltic Sea freeze (5 Mar 10)
Thick Baltic ice causes ferry havoc (4 Mar 10)
Three Baltic ferries stuck in the ice (3 Mar 10)
"There are no more ships stuck in the ice," Ann Ericsson of the Swedish Maritime Administration's ice breaker unit, told AFP.
A number of vessels, including several large passenger ferries shuttling as many as 1,000 passengers each between Sweden, Finland and Estonia, become stuck Thursday just outside the Stockholm archipelago, where freezing winds had pushed thick ice towards the coast.
"We have not slept much," Lena, a passenger on the Amorella ferry that broke free from the ice early Friday, told Sveriges Radio (SR).
"We've been interested in watching all the ice breakers and helicopters work."
Two small ice breakers on Thursday failed to free the Amorella and several other smaller ferries, which had been forced to wait for the larger Ymer ice breaker to sail down from the Bay of Bothnia in the north.
There it had been working to free as many as 50 cargo ships and commercial vessels, some of which had been stuck for days, and in one case since last Saturday, according to the maritime administration.
Twelve ships were still docked near the central port city of Sundsvall for that ice breaker to return to escort them out, according to Ericsson.
"They're waiting for help, but none of them are stuck," she said, adding that the winds had died down and conditions at sea had become easier.
The Amorella ferry, which has the capacity to carry up to 1,313 passengers and crew, had collided with a Finnfellow ferry trapped nearby while trying to free itself from the ice.
Its owner Viking Line however insisted no damage was done to the ship and that there had at no time been any danger to the passengers.
Passengers on the Amorella were requested to move to the front of the boat to avoid any collision impact, according to Mats Nyström, one of the passengers.
The two ships "were simply drifting towards each other," he told SR from the stranded ferry.
Finnfellow passenger Tapio Sippo meanwhile told Finnish tabloid Ilta-Sanomat that "there was a big crash."
"The staff panicked more than us tough truck drivers," he added.
The Swedish Maritime Administration issued a warning to ships not to take the route where most of the ferries became stuck.
"They got caught outside the archipelago, where there is moving ice. It's hard to navigate," Johny Lindvall, also of the Swedish Maritime Administration's ice breaker unit, told AFP Thursday, adding that he had not seen so many ships stuck at once since the mid-1980s.
Sweden has suffered an unusually harsh winter this year, with temperatures across the country almost continuously well below freezing since December.
The large ferries are equipped to break their way through the thin layers of ice that often cover parts of the Baltic they traffic, but Swedish maritime authorities criticised their decision to ignore its warning and attempt to take the treacherous route near the Stockholm archipelago.
"The problem is that these big ferries think they can handle the ice. They have extremely powerful engines, but in this case the ice was simply too difficult for them," Ulf Gullne, also of the administration's ice breaker unit, told SR.
http://www.thelocal.se/25364/20100305/
波羅的海4艘客輪破冰脫險
更新時間 2010年 3月 5日, 格林尼治標準時間11:22
由於冰情嚴重，導致許多船隻受困於海上據瑞典官員說，被困在波羅的海的四艘客輪成功破冰脫險，但仍有大約50艘船隻被困。
一些船隻被困在瑞典首都斯德哥爾摩和芬蘭的奧蘭群島之間，還有另外一些船受阻於波的尼亞灣。
據瑞典海事管理當局說，許多船隻可能不會在數小時之內獲救。
但他們說沒有人受傷，並且目前沒有營救計劃，但瑞典當局已經提高了安全戒備。
瑞典海事管理局官員林德奎斯特告訴BBC說救援人員隨時準備待命提供救援。
據美聯社報道，一艘載有近1000人的Amorella號渡輪 終於成功破冰，恢復航行。
此外，還有另外兩艘船在星期四（4日）衝破冰層，擺脫困境。
瑞典和芬蘭已經動用了破冰船試圖解救仍然被困的船隻。
有驚無險
瑞典海事當局負責破冰營救任務的官員表示，通常冰層對商船不會構成威脅，但目前的問題主要是由於風大。
因此冰移動的速度非常快，導致許多巨大的冰凌阻擋船隻正常航行。
有兩艘船在試圖破冰前行時還發生了相撞事故，但並不嚴重。
一位在Amorella油輪上的乘客表示，船上的乘客突然接到通知，要他們都集中到船尾，那一刻令人感到意外，但沒有人感到恐慌。
據報，這是15年以來波羅的海冰情最嚴重的一次，但林德奎斯特說，預計星期五的天氣情況會有所好轉。
http://www.bbc.co.uk/zhongwen/trad/world/2010/03/100305_baltic_ships.shtml
俄500多人因海面結冰被困海上 破冰船前往營救
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