4 dead, 17 missing in disaster at sea

Rescue efforts are underway in the search for over a dozen crew members missing from a Spanish fishing vessel that sank off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada on Monday evening, Spain’s government has said. Four fatalities have been confirmed so far.

Three survivors were found on a lifeboat, where they were suffering from hypothermia after being submerged in the extremely cold Atlantic waters, the Spanish Coast Guard said. Two other lifeboats were found empty, and a fourth is missing.

The vessel had 24 crew members on board at the time of the disaster, according to Spain’s maritime rescue service. The crew included 16 Spaniards, as well as citizens from Ghana and Peru. The remaining 17 are still unaccounted for, and the cause of the vessel’s sinking is not currently known.

Spain's maritime rescue service named the vessel as the Villa del Pitanxo, operated by commercial fishing firm Nores Marin which is based in the city of Pontevedra, in the northwestern region of Galicia. The fishing company operates in the South Atlantic, both off the coast of Canada and between Mauritania and Guinea-Bissau. According to its website, the firm was founded in 1950, operates eight trawlers, and employs around 300 people. 

Maica Larriba, the central government representative in Pontevedra, confirmed that bodies had been recovered and efforts were continuing to locate the missing crew.