Ship that ran aground with 'danger' cargo is towed to safety

Coast guards last night succeeded in refloating a large container ship with 27 crew on board which had ran aground in the Dover Strait off the coast of Kent.

The 90,465-tonne LT Cortesia was en route to the Suez Canal when it hit the Varne Bank, nine miles south of Dover harbour. The Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) said no one on board had been injured and the ship appeared watertight.
The vessel was carrying 4,148 containers, some of which was "hazardous cargo", but they were reported to be secure. The exact nature of the materials on board was unknown. Three commercial tugboats took an hour to pull the vessel off the sandbank and they then towed it to an anchorage three miles off the town of Deal.
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