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Cornwall coastguards try to refloat grounded Russian cargo ship

A rescue operation is under way to try to refloat a Russian cargo ship that ran aground off a Cornish beach in gale-force winds.

The emergency services in Cornwall declared a major incident after the 16,000-tonne Kuzma Minin grounded off Falmouth’s Gyllyngvase beach before dawn with 18 Russian crew, but no cargo, on board.

HM Coastguard plans to try to refloat the listing 180-metre carrier at high tide, just after 1pm.

At around 9am on Tuesday a coastguard pilot was winched on to the stranded ship via helicopter, in a moment captured in video footage.

Speaking to BBC Radio Cornwall, Marc Thomas, the coastguard’s senior operations manager, said: “We have three harbour tugs here and what we are trying to do is get a line on to the vessel so that we can tow it off the beach as the tide starts to flood in.”

He said two of the three tugs had managed to secure a line. The bow of the boat appeared to be touching rocks but no pollution had been reported, he added.

Speaking from the scene at 11.20am, Harry Dennis, a science and policy officer from Surfers Against Sewage, said part of the boat appeared to be free of the beach. “It is rocking with the waves, but it seems that the bow of the ship is still grounded,” he told the Guardian. “It has rotated so it looks as if the stern could be free.”

Earlier, the coastguard said the Kuzma Minin grounded at 5.40am after dragging its anchor during strong winds.

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It said in a statement: “A lifeboat is standing by at the scene. The Falmouth coastguard rescue team have cordoned off an area around the ship.”

The vessel was reported to have set off from the port of Terneuzen in the Netherlands.

Falmouth’s former senior pilot captain David Barnicoat said the grounding occurred during “horrendous” winds.

He told BBC Radio Cornwall: “It’s a classic grounding in bad weather and strong winds. The wind overnight was pretty horrendous. Where I live I hadn’t heard wind like it for quite a few years.”

Of the ship, he said: “It sounds as if she dragged anchor and the engines may not have been ready or she may have had some other problem. Once that anchor breaks from the seabed and you start dragging then you have no control whatsoever.”

He said he was not sure the tugs could pull the boat to safety.

“Our tugs won’t be powerful enough to get her off unless the wind dies right away. You need something of about 100 tonnes and we just don’t have that available.”

He also warned of the risk of pollution. “Just to the south-west of the beach it is all rocky shoreline so there is potential for pollution.”

Data from the shipping monitoring site Marine Traffic showed the Kuzma Minin started to move ashore just after 4am when southerly winds were gusting at around 55mph.

Dennis said Surfers Against Sewage were monitoring the rescue attempts. “We are going to be reporting if anything changes, particularly if there is any potential pollution incident. We know that this vessel wasn’t carrying cargo, but there will be fuel tanks on board.”

The Falmouth resident Jess Hughes described the weather on the Cornish coast as “extreme”.

“As you come over the crest of the hill there’s just this huge ship where there shouldn’t be,” she told the Press Association. “Last night it was horrendously windy and now there’s gravel up by the road so it was a good high tide.”