Gabon oil rig disaster: Three bodies found in sunken platform - IOL
Three bodies have been found in the wreckage of a sunken Gabon oil rig, while at least one person remains missing after the disaster.
Three bodies have been found in the underwater wreckage of a drilling platform that collapsed off oil-rich Gabon at the weekend, according to the authorities.
At least one other person is still missing after a severe structural failure caused the Prospector 5 oil rig to sink off the central African country's southern shores on Saturday evening with 115 people aboard.
Five people went missing in the wake of the disaster. One victim, an Indian citizen,Β had already been confirmed dead by the Gabonese authorities on Tuesday on the basis of survivors' testimonies, though the body had not been found.
Three Gabonese nationals and a Croatian were also yet to be found.
The bodies were found on Wednesday "inside the still-sunken wreck", said Charles Hubert Bekale-Meyong, the Gabonese naval officer in charge of the search-and-rescue operations.
In an overnight statement aired by the country's Gabon24 public broadcaster, the vice-admiral credited underwater robots for the discovery.
But "the images collected have not allowed us to identify the bodies in question", he added.
Teams were preparing to retrieve the bodies of the deceased, which would allow for their identification, according to the statement.
It was unclear whether the Indian citizen already considered dead was among the bodies discovered in the platform's wreckage.
The Prospector 5 rig, operated by the Bermuda-based Borr Drilling contractor, was preparing for a campaign of fossil fuel extraction when the disaster struck.
It was supporting the drilling work of BW Energy, a Norwegian firm which describes itself on its website as an "independent oil and gas company with operations and developments in Gabon, Brazil, and Namibia".
Gabon's oil and gas ministry has opened an inquiry into the cause of the accident.
The government has promised to make its conclusions public.
