Around 30 fishermen were left stranded on an ice floe in the northern Pacific Ocean in Russia’s Far East early on Monday.
The ice floe the men had been fishing from broke free from the land and reportedly floated more than 10 meters into the sea within an hour.
“Interviewed experts could not say what the 30 people were counting on after venturing to sea despite warnings and common sense and finding themselves on a torn ice floe,” the ministry wrote in a statement.
The Sakhalin region’s Emergency Situations Ministry had warned last week to avoid the southeastern shore of the Sakhalin peninsula as winds have caused land ice to melt.
The Sakhalin.info news website reported that all the fishermen had been evacuated to shore by late Monday.
“Interestingly, the last two remaining [fishermen] on the ice floe declined to get on the boat, arguing that the fish was biting,” the site reported.
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