One dead, one missing as freighter founders

Rescue ships and helicopters combed the seas off the Aegean island of Skyros yesterday for a seaman missing since early morning when a Greek freighter abruptly listed and sank in a heavy swell. First Mate Georgios Delinikolaou, 53, was the only one of the Philippos KII’s eight crew members and two passengers not to be found by an air force helicopter that arrived at the scene some 11 miles east-north-east of Skyros shortly after the accident. The rest were located on an inflatable raft in the sea. They were all taken to Skyros, where one of the passengers, Eleni Kaiafa, 61 – the wife of shipowner Emmanouil Kaiafas, 61, who was also on board – suffered a fatal heart attack. The Philippos KII had set sail from Kavala to Crete with a load of 1,640 tons of fertilizer. Winds of up to eight on the Beaufort scale were blowing in the area of the shipwreck.