The Sri Lankan Navy with assistance from Indian ships was battling for a second day on Friday to douse a major fire raging on an oil tanker carrying crude from Kuwait to India that left one of its 23 crew members dead.
The Sri Lankan Navy on Friday confirmed that a Filipino sailor died in a boiler explosion in the engine room of the Panama registered tanker MT New Diamond that caught fire on Thursday.
The Navy said that 22 of the 23 member crew had been safely rescued off the tanker.
The tanker was carrying 270,000 metric tonnes of crude oil from Kuwait to India when its engine room caught fire off the coast of Sangamankanda in the eastern district of Ampara.
