Russian captain in North Sea ship collision charged with manslaughter

The Russian cargo ship’s Russian captain, who crashed into a US fuel tanker in the North Sea this week, has been charged with manslaughter and gross negligence for the death of a crew member.

Vladimir Motin, 59, from Primorsky in Saint Petersburg, Russia, was remanded in police custody and scheduled to appear in court in Hull on Saturday, according to a report released by Humberside police on Friday night.

The Portuguese-flagged Solong container ship, led by Motin, slammed into the Stena Immaculate tanker at full speed on Monday as it was anchoring off Hull, in northeastern England. US military jet fuel was being transported from the Stena Immaculate.

One of the Solong crew members, 38-year-old Filipino national Mark Angelo Pernia, vanished during the collision, which resulted in numerous fires and explosions. He is now “presumed” dead.

The missing crew member, who is now reportedly deceased, was the subject of extensive searches carried out by HM Coastguard, according to a statement from Humberside police.

The family is being supported by officers with special training, the statement continued.

The 36 remaining crew members on both ships made it out of the situation and were rescued.

The Russian embassy in London announced on Friday that its diplomats had a “detailed telephone conversation with the ship’s captain” on Thursday.

He claims that he feels well. The Russian national has been given access to an interpreter and a lawyer, according to the embassy, adding that it had “close contact with the British competent authorities” as well.

The Stena Immaculate is still anchored at the time of the collision, but the Solong drifted south of the site, according to the coastguard, which boarded the two vessels to conduct initial damage assessments.

The vessels were “stable,” according to chief coastguard Paddy O’Callaghan in an update released on Friday.

“On the Solong, there are currently only a few small, occasionally intermittent pockets of fire that don’t concern us excessively. There is still “no cause for concern” about pollution from the collision, according to O’Callaghan, who added that special tugs with firefighting capability are stationed at both vessels’ locations.

Investigators are still looking into the crash’s causes despite the British government’s decision to not implicate foul play.