The man who jumped overboard from a ship in Ofotfjorden was a Syrian stowaway

CoastguardPhoto: Cornelius Poppe / NTB

The man who fell over the side of a ship that was on its way into the Ofotfjord to Narvik on Saturday was a stowaway from Syria, the police announced.

On January 1, the crew on board the ship that was on its way to Norway discovered a stowaway. 

Nine days later, the man is said to have jumped overboard in Ofotfjorden outside Narvik. 

Emergency services were notified of a man overboard at 10:27 AM on Saturday.

Police chief Ingunn Opdal Iversen, who is leading the investigation of the case, informed Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) that the missing person is a man in his 40s who was a stowaway on the ship.

Crew interrogated 

The man did not have identification or papers on him, but he allegedly told the crew that he was from Syria. 

The first message from the crew was that the man had jumped overboard.

“We are investigating the case and can’t say more as long as the investigation is ongoing. 

“We have police out on the ship now, who are conducting further interrogations of the crew, as well as crime scene investigations,” Opdal Iversen told NRK on Monday.

Both ambulance helicopters, coast guard ships, and several vessels participated in the search, which ended at 6:00 PM on Saturday. 

Beach search

“Following the search, the Armed Forces carried out a beach search in a huge area. The search has been canceled for the time being,” Iversen said. 

The police are working together with Kripos, the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration, and Interpol in the hope of identifying the man in order to later be able to notify his family and relatives.

Hans Björkestam, who is responsible for the safety and the environment in the Finnish shipping company ESL Shipping Ltd, which owns the ship “Arkadia,” says the man probably came on board when the vessel was in the Mediterranean, probably in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in North Africa, where they left port New Year’s Eve.

Source: © NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today / #NorwayTodayNews

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