Madrid: Three fishermen were killed and two were missing after a giant cargo ship crashed into their trawler off northern Spain on Tuesday, officials said.
The Baltic Breeze, a 164-metre (541-foot) vehicle-carrier, collided with the 34-metre Mar de Marin near the Spanish port of Vigo, the local coastguard said.
"The fishing boat and the cargo ship were alerted" to try to avoid the crash, "but in the end it was inevitable because they were very close, we do not know why," Vigo coastguard official Jose Maria Suarez-Llanos told Spanish television.
"Of the five people we were searching for, we have recovered three from the sea, unfortunately deceased," he said.
One of those killed was a Moroccan and another was Ghanaian, he said. The other seaman who was found dead and the two still missing were all from the nearby Spanish region of Galicia.
Five other crew members from the fishing boat were rescued after the collision near the Cies Islands at the mouth of the Ria de Vigo estuary, the coastguard said.
A coastguard source told AFP the Baltic Breeze was entering the port of Vigo and the fishing boat was leaving it when they crashed. The cargo ship suffered no known casualties.
