India rescues two Chinese crew after Panama-flagged ship sinks off eastern coast with 22 missing

Search-and-rescue operations continued off India’s eastern coast on Sunday after a Panama-flagged cargo vessel, the *Ocean Winner*, sank with 24 crew members aboard, authorities said.
The Indian Coast Guard and Navy have rescued two Chinese nationals from life rafts, while 22 others—18 Chinese, three from Myanmar, and one from Bangladesh—remain missing, according to Shyam Jagannathan, director general of India’s Maritime Administration. The two survivors told rescuers the vessel developed a list on Friday and sank within eight minutes, forcing the crew to abandon ship, Jagannathan said .
The *Ocean Winner*, a 225-meter bulk carrier flying the Panama flag, was transporting iron ore from India’s Paradip port in Odisha state to Singapore when it sent a distress signal around 11:48 a.m. on Saturday, according to the maritime rescue center in Sri Vijaya Puram. The ship lost contact approximately 240 nautical miles from Paradip, government sources said .
A diverted merchant tanker, the *MT Aisopos*, pulled the two survivors to safety at 8:00 p.m. on Saturday, according to a post by Akash Sharma . The Indian Coast Guard has deployed two vessels from Sri Vijaya Puram, formerly known as Port Blair, and the Navy has coordinated aerial surveillance, including a maritime patrol aircraft that located life rafts in the area, the Navy said in a post on X .
Jagannathan noted that survival chances typically decline sharply after 12 hours in such conditions, but rescuers were continuing the search. The cause of the sinking remains unknown, authorities said .
The *Ocean Winner* is a 28-year-old vessel, according to publicly available maritime data .
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