The crew of a pure car carrier carrying around 3,000 vehicles, including 800 electric vehicles, abandoned it off the coast of Alaska after a fire broke out onboard, its operator Zodiac Maritime said on Wednesday.
The 22 crew members were safely evacuated the ship after they failed to put out the fire onboard the Morning Midas, Zodiac said as it focuses on salvaging the vessel.
The US Coast Guard said on Wednesday it was responding to a fire on board a 600-foot (183-metre) pure car carrier near Alaska, but added that no injuries had been reported.
They were evacuated via lifeboat and were being transferred to a nearby merchant vessel in tandem with the US Coast Guard.
Morning Midas was located 300 miles (482.8 kilometres) southwest of Adak in Alaska. Smoke was initially seen rising from a deck loaded with EVs, the company said. It is not clear what brand of vehicles the ship was carrying.
The Liberia-flagged, 2006-built PCC's destination was set for Lazaro Cardenas in Mexico, according to LSEG data. It has a reported capacity of 4,902 CEU.
The coast guard said that aircrew and a cutter ship have been sent to assist with the situation and three vessels were already on the scene.
One of the vessel's ship insurers, Steamship Mutual, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
(Reporting by Shubham Kalia and Rajveer Singh Pardesi in Bengaluru; Editing by Kirsten Donovan)