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Indian Navy submarine collides with a fishing vessel off Goa coast, two fishermen missing

The Navy has launched a rescue operation to trace the missing two crew members of the vessel. Indian Navy has also ordered a high-level inquiry into the incident

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An Indian Navy submarine collided with a fishing vessel about 70 nautical miles off the Goa coast on Thursday late evening. A rescue operation is currently underway to trace the two missing crew members of the fishing vessel. 

The fishing vessel, Marthoma, had a total of 13 crew members and 11 of them were rescued in the search operation. 

Six ships and a few surveillance aircraft were deployed by the Navy for the rescue mission. 

"An Indian fishing vessel Marthoma with a crew of 13, reportedly, collided with an Indian Naval unit on November 21 about 70 nm North West of Goa," an Indian Navy spokesperson said.

"Search and rescue efforts were immediately launched by the Indian Navy with six ships and aircraft. Eleven crew have been rescued so far," he added.

The Navy is coordinating the rescue efforts with the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC) in Mumbai. 

A high-level investigation into the incident was ordered by the Navy. 

The spokesperson said additional assets, including from the Coast Guard, have been diverted to the area of the incident to augment the rescue efforts. 

The vessel collided with the Navy's Scorpene class submarine, which is capable of executing a wider range of functions, including anti-surface warfare, anti-submarine warfare, intelligence gathering, mine laying and area surveillance. 

The Navy has not released further details on the collision. 

In August this year, a fishing boat collided with a Sri Lankan naval vessel and one fisherman drowned, off the coast of Tamil Nadu. 

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