MOSCOW, September 26. /TASS/. The police of the Norwegian city of Tromso imposed a 300-meter security zone around the burning Russian trawler in its port and ordered everyone within it to evacuate.
"The chief of [Tromso] police made the decision to announce evacuation and establish a security zone 300 meters around the burning trawler," city police said in a statement released via Twitter.
Residents of territories subjected to evacuation should contact law enforcement bodies if they require assistance.
The Bukhta Nayezdnik fishing trawler caught fire in the Norwegian port of Tromso during maintenance works and planned rotation of the crew, the ship-owner company Murmansk Trawl Fleet informed TASS earlier. Norway’s NRK channel reported, citing the Tromso County police, that hydraulic oil had caught fire onboard the vessel. According to the ship-owner, all 29 crew members of the trawler have been evacuated.
On Wednesday night, Police spokesman Morten Pettersen said the fire, previously thought to have been contained, has gone out of control again, and there were fears that it might reach a reservoir with ammonia on board.
According to the spokesman, police was considering two possible options. The first one was to create the 300-meter security zone around the burning vessel and to evacuate everyone inside it. The second one is to extinguish the fire by sinking the vessel.
According to the ship-owner company, Bukhta Nayezdnik is a medium-sized fishing trawler built in 1991 in Norway. The vessel is used for haddock and cod fishing in the North-East Atlantic.