The oil tanker and the cargo ship collided on Monday (Image: Getty)
Pro-Putin propagandists are floating a wild conspiracy theory, accusing Britain of being behind the North Sea ship collision. The captain of the Solong container ship – now in custody – is Russian, it was revealed today.
The Portuguese-flagged vessel rammed the 50,000-ton Stena Immaculate – a US oil tanker – off the English coast, triggering a fire on both ships. The Russian captain has not been named by Humberside police but was arrested “on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter in connection with the collision”. Floating the conspiracy theory, Kremlin propagandist pro-war pundit Sergey Mardan claimed: “There are many interesting coincidences and details in this case.
One person is still missing (Image: Getty)
“Pentagon fuel, a tanker flying an exotic American flag for the merchant fleet, and now a Russian captain. The location of the emergency should also be taken into account – the territorial waters of Great Britain.”
He added: “The British are great experts in organising sabotage and provocations. For the sake of such a deal, they would easily [harm] both an American tanker and a piece of their own coastline.”
Russian media commentator Vladimir Kornilov, an analyst for Putin-controlled state news outlet Today, also waded in, saying: “How predictable everything is with the British. The arrested captain of the Portuguese dry cargo ship Solong, which rammed an American military tanker off the coast of England just before the [war] negotiations between and the USA, of course, turned out to be a Russian citizen.”
He had predicted earlier “that London would definitely look for a ‘Russian trace’.” He claimed: “Something tells me that this whole accident was organised under this ‘trace’.”
The collision happened on Monday (Image: Getty)
The 459ft Solong – with a crew of Russian and Filipino nationals – crashed into the 596ft Stena Immaculate on Monday.
A port inspection in July 2024 in Dublin found the vessel’s “emergency steering position communications/compass reading” unreadable.
Inspectors found a total of 10 deficiencies, including “inadequate” alarms, survival craft “not properly maintained” and fire doors “not as required.”
A later inspection in Scotland in October found two other deficiencies, yet the ship wasn’t detained after either inspection.
One sailor from the Solong remains missing, presumed dead. The other 36 crew members from the two vessels were brought safely ashore, with no major injuries.