26 people still missing in Cyclone Tauktae, Navy teams are searching

Six days after the cyclone ‘Tauktae’ struck, 15 of the Barge P305 and 11 of the tugboat boat Varaprada are still missing, the Navy on Saturday deployed special dive teams to the Mumbai offshore area to locate them. The special dive team left Mumbai this morning aboard INS Makar and INS Tarasa with side-scan sonar to augment the ongoing search and rescue operations to find the missing crew of the Bajra P305 and ferry Varaprada. The death toll from the drowning of the Barge P305 in the Arabian Sea on Monday rose to 11 with the recovery of bodies and 60 on Friday, while the Navy and Coast Guard continued to search for 15 missing personnel from the barge and 11 from Varapadra. New information is awaited on the overnight campaign. In this regard, an official said that the hope of surviving missing people is now decreasing. Of the 261 personnel aboard the P305 barge, 186 have been rescued so far. Two of the 13 people aboard Varaprada have been rescued. The Mumbai Police has said that it will investigate why the cyclone stayed in the disturbed area despite the warning of ‘Toute’. The police have also registered a case of accidental death in the case of the death of the personnel on the barge.