The Indian Navy on Sunday ordered an inquiry into the causes of the mishap on its Torpedo Recovery Vessel, resulting in the death of one sailor, with a further four missing.
"The Navy will do whatever it can to carry on the search. We have ordered an inquiry and the investigation will go into the details of the incident and the Navy will give whatever assistance and help required by the families [of the missing]," Indian Navy Chief of Naval Staff Admiral RK Dhowan told the media.
Earlier in the day, Admiral Dhowan met the family of sailor James Jacob, who died in the mishap.
The Torpedo Recovery Vessel, TRV-72 on Thursday night sunk off the Visakhapatnam coast during a naval exercise killing. According to reports, 23 personnel of the 28 sailors on board have been rescued safely by Indian naval ships.
The vessel was on an exercise and its task was to recover practice torpedoes fired by ships of the fleet when flooding occurred in one of the compartments, the Indian Navy said in a statement.
TRV-72 was deployed for a routine torpedo recovery mission. On completion, the vessel was returning to the harbour, when it reported flooding in its steering gear compartment. Naval ships in the vicinity were immediately rushed to render assistance. Additionally, Dornier and Boeing P8I aircrafts were also deployed.
TRV-72 was built at Goa Shipyard and was commissioned into the Indian Navy on 23 February 1983.
Earlier on October 31, INS Kora also suffered minor damage after it was scraped by a merchant vessel near Visakhapatnam.
