THIRTEEN Filipino seafarers have made it home after more than five months aboard an abandoned livestock carrier ship, the Yangtze Harmony, thanks to the intervention of the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF), reports Singapore's Splash 247.
The ship's owners abandoned the vessel and its crew after the ship was arrested in October 2022 in Singapore over an unpaid fuel bill. That is when the shipowner also stopped paying the entire crew, leaving them without wages or a way to get home. By April, the crew were owed US$429,972.
The itf said the Yangtze Harmony's Hong Kong-based shipowner had a long history of abandoning crew, and its vessels have been detained before for violating safety and crew welfare rules.
But what the ITF's inspectors didn't expect, however, was that the shipping company would abandon another crew in addition to the Yangtze Harmony at the same time.
Between the Yangtze Harmony and the Yangtze Fortune, the ITF's months of advocacy would recover $1 million in backpay owed to the crew, as well as flights home for the 43 seafarers.
SeaNews Turkey
The ship's owners abandoned the vessel and its crew after the ship was arrested in October 2022 in Singapore over an unpaid fuel bill. That is when the shipowner also stopped paying the entire crew, leaving them without wages or a way to get home. By April, the crew were owed US$429,972.
The itf said the Yangtze Harmony's Hong Kong-based shipowner had a long history of abandoning crew, and its vessels have been detained before for violating safety and crew welfare rules.
But what the ITF's inspectors didn't expect, however, was that the shipping company would abandon another crew in addition to the Yangtze Harmony at the same time.
Between the Yangtze Harmony and the Yangtze Fortune, the ITF's months of advocacy would recover $1 million in backpay owed to the crew, as well as flights home for the 43 seafarers.
SeaNews Turkey