January 23, 2007	Tuesday	Muharram 03, 1428

RIGA, Jan 22: A second ship in as many weeks has run aground off the western coast of Latvia, but this time the accident was not due to bad weather but because the captain of the ship was drunk, officials said on Monday.

Four other crew members of the Maltese-flagged cargo ship were also sailing under the influence, a spokeswoman for the Latvian navy said.

“It was negligence on the part of the captain and lack of professionalism of the crew” that caused the Nijord to run aground on Sunday, navy spokeswoman Iveta Kraule said.

“A towboat is currently taking the ship off the sandbank, after which it will travel on its own steam to Riga,” Ms Kraule said.

The captain of the Nijord has been taken to the port of Ventspils, she added.

According to the Baltic News Service (BNS), the Russian ship’s captain was more than two times over the legal limit for driving.

The accident came a week after another freighter, the Cyprus-registered Golden Sky, ran aground off Ventspils in severe weather.

“Unfortunately, alcohol is involved in one of the cases. We don’t need this -- we have enough problems with drunk drivers already. When you add drunken sailors to that -- that is not a normal situation,” Krists Leiskalns, a spokesman for the interior ministry, said.

—AFP