Cruise ship goes down off Antarctica

Authorities said later that all the rescued passengers had disembarked at the King George Island base and were hoping the weather would clear enough to airlift to Chile's southernmost city of Punta Arenas on Saturday.

G.A.P Adventures is a tour company that provides excursions with an environmental focus. The Explorer was on a 19-day circuit of Antarctica and the Falkland Islands letting passengers observe penguins, whales and other wildlife while getting briefings from experts on the region.

Traveling to Antarctica is always risky, Hayes said.

"There is ice in the area. Obviously it's a hazard of the area. But it's highly unusual (that the ship would hit the ice). This has never happened to us," he said.

An Argentine rescue and command center received the first distress call at 12:30 a.m. EST Friday from the Explorer amid reports it was taking on water despite efforts to use onboard pumps, said Capt. Juan Pablo Panichini, an Argentine navy spokesman.

A navy statement said that the captain ordered passengers to abandon ship about 90 minutes after the first call and that passengers and crew boarded eight semi-rigid lifeboats and four life rafts, with the captain leaving the ship later.

In lifeboats in subfreezing temperatures
A Chilean ornithologist identified as Paola Palavecino was quoted in an Argentine media report as saying she and others aboard went into the lifeboats before dawn and endured subfreezing temperatures for a few hours until they were picked up about 6 a.m. EST.

"The ship took on water quickly," she was quoted by the Argentine news agency Diarios y Noticias as telling a local radio station in a call from the Nordnorge.

A commander at Chile's air base on King George island confirmed late Friday that the Nordnorge had arrived in a bay near the base, but said waves and strong winds had prevented the passengers from immediately disembarking.

He said Chilean air force planes, weather permitting, would fly the survivors on Saturday to Punta Arenas at the southernmost tip of Chile.

An Argentine navy statement said the Explorer was about 475 nautical miles southeast of Ushuaia, the southernmost Argentine city and a jumping-off point for cruise ships and supply vessels for Antarctica. Seas were calm and winds light at the time of the accident, officials said.

Last Feb. 1, the Nordnorge evacuated 294 passengers, including 119 Americans, from a sister Norwegian cruise ship, the MS Nordkapp, which ran aground off a remote Antarctic island. The Nordkapp later pulled off the rocks under its own power and authorities said those passengers were never in danger.

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