Sick US tourist taken off liner on Cape coast

AN ELDERLY American tourist was evacuated from a cruise liner and admitted to hospital in Mossel Bay on the Southern Cape coast after he apparently suffered a stroke, the National Sea Rescue Institute said at the weekend.

The NSRI Station 15 Mossel Bay crew were alerted around 8pm on Friday by the provincial emergency medical services of a 73-year-old American man suffering a suspected stroke aboard the cruise liner Seven Seas Explora, NSRI Mossel Bay station commander Andre Fraser said.

“We began the preparations to launch sea rescue craft, and ambulance services dispatched paramedics to join in the operation,” he said.

Earlier, the Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre had been alerted, and an emergency medical services duty doctor contacted the ship, assisted by Telkom Maritime Radio Services.

At the time, the ship was about two hours from Mossel Bay.

Its last port of call was Cape Town, and it was heading to Port Elizabeth.

NSRI Station 15 Mossel Bay dispatched two sea rescue craft, Rescue 15 and St Blaze Rescuer, accompanied by paramedics from By Grace ambulance services.

On arrival at the scene,

5.5 nautical miles east of Mossel Bay, in 30- to 40-knot north-easterly winds and a 3- to 4-metre sea swell, a paramedic and two NSRI rescue swimmers were transferred onto the ship.

“The patient, in a serious but stable condition, was secured onto a stretcher and was then transferred to the sea rescue craft and brought to shore in the care of the paramedics. He was then transported to hospital, accompanied by his wife,” Fraser said.