A commercial vessel caught fire while underway off the Port of Jeju in South Korea on Friday, February 6.
The locally-registered pure car and truck carrier (PCTC) Seaworld Marine 2 was en route to the Port of Mokpo when a blaze ignited on board shortly after 17:00 local time on Friday.
An alarm was activated after the blaze was detected in one of the 86 trucks that were among the embarked cargo at the time. The crew then initiated firefighting procedures while the captain ordered that the ship be turned around to head back to Jeju.
The Korea Coast Guard deployed patrol vessels and a helicopter to the area as the PCTC made her way back to port.
Upon the ship's arrival, she was boarded by local firefighting teams that had been dispatched to assist the crew.
The blaze was fully extinguished within an hour of the ship's arrival at Jeju. Three trucks suffered damage from the fire while two crewmembers and two truck drivers were evacuated to hospital to be treated for smoke inhalation.
The coast guard and other local authorities have begun investigating the incident.
