A man in Norway awoke early on Thursday to discover a huge container ship had run aground a stone’s throw from his fjord-side house — and he had slept through the commotion.
For an as-yet unknown reason, the 135m NCL Salten sailed up onto shore just meters from Johan Helberg’s house in a fjord near Trondheim in central Norway.
Helberg only discovered the unexpected visitor when a panicked neighbor who had rung his doorbell repeatedly to no avail gave up and called him on the phone.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“The doorbell rang at a time of day when I don’t like to open,” Helberg told television channel TV2.
His neighbor, Jostein Jorgensen, said he was roused at about 5am by the sound of a ship heading at full speed toward land and immediately ran to Helberg’s house.
“I was sure that he was already outside, but no, there was no sign of life. I rang the doorbell many times and nothing ... and it was only when I called him on the phone that I managed to contact him,” Jorgensen told TV2.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Several hours later, the massive red and green container ship was still stuck near the wooden house, waiting to be refloated.
When Helberg awoke, he looked out of his window to see the ship’s bow.
“I went to the window and was quite astonished to see a big ship,” he said. “I had to bend my neck to see the top of it. It was so unreal.”
Photo: AP
“Normally ships turn left or right into the fjord, but this went straight ahead,” said Helberg, who has lived in the house for 25 years. “It was very close to the house.”
“It’s a very bulky new neighbor, but it will soon go away,” an amused Helberg said.
There were 16 crew members, among them Norwegians, Lithuanians, Ukrainians and Russians, on board the Cyprus-registered ship. There were no reports of injuries or oil spills. Police are investigating the incident and have identified one suspect on board the boat.
Police have interviewed the crew and are working on several theories, including technical failure and human error.
Additional reporting by The Guardian
DEADLOCK: Putin has vowed to continue fighting unless Ukraine cedes more land, while talks have been paused with no immediate results expected, the Kremlin said Russia on Friday said that peace talks with Kyiv were on “pause” as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned that Russian President Vladimir Putin still wanted to capture the whole of Ukraine. Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump said that he was running out of patience with Putin, and the NATO alliance said it would bolster its eastern front after Russian drones were shot down in Polish airspace this week. The latest blow to faltering diplomacy came as Russia’s army staged major military drills with its key ally Belarus. Despite Trump forcing the warring sides to hold direct talks and hosting Putin in Alaska, there
North Korea has executed people for watching or distributing foreign television shows, including popular South Korean dramas, as part of an intensifying crackdown on personal freedoms, a UN human rights report said on Friday. Surveillance has grown more pervasive since 2014 with the help of new technologies, while punishments have become harsher — including the introduction of the death penalty for offences such as sharing foreign TV dramas, the report said. The curbs make North Korea the most restrictive country in the world, said the 14-page UN report, which was based on interviews with more than 300 witnesses and victims who had
COMFORT WOMEN CLASH: Japan has strongly rejected South Korean court rulings ordering the government to provide reparations to Korean victims of sexual slavery The Japanese government yesterday defended its stance on wartime sexual slavery and described South Korean court rulings ordering Japanese compensation as violations of international law, after UN investigators criticized Tokyo for failing to ensure truth-finding and reparations for the victims. In its own response to UN human rights rapporteurs, South Korea called on Japan to “squarely face up to our painful history” and cited how Tokyo’s refusal to comply with court orders have denied the victims payment. The statements underscored how the two Asian US allies still hold key differences on the issue, even as they pause their on-and-off disputes over historical
CONSOLIDATION: The Indonesian president has used the moment to replace figures from former president Jokowi’s tenure with loyal allies In removing Indonesia’s finance minister and U-turning on protester demands, the leader of Southeast Asia’s biggest economy is scrambling to restore public trust while seizing a chance to install loyalists after deadly riots last month, experts say. Demonstrations that were sparked by low wages, unemployment and anger over lawmakers’ lavish perks grew after footage spread of a paramilitary police vehicle running over a delivery motorcycle driver. The ensuing riots, which rights groups say left at least 10 dead and hundreds detained, were the biggest of Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto’s term, and the ex-general is now calling on the public to restore their
RSS