ITALIAN authorities have disembarked some 360 cold and hungry migrants from a ship abandoned by its crew off the country’s jagged southern coast.

Women and children were among hundreds of migrants left stranded aboard the Ezadeen, which docked in the port of Corigliano Calabro late on Friday after a delicate operation by the Italian navy to take control of the ageing vessel.

It had been left to drift in stormy seas off southern Italy without fuel or electricity.

In the dark rescuers had first thought that it could be holding up to 450 people but after docking, the authorities revised the count to 360.

Most of the 232 men, 54 women and 74 children aboard are thought to be Syrians fleeing the war in their homeland. They were all said to be in good health.

Six coastguard officers were lowered from a helicopter onto the deck of the Sierra Leone-flagged vessel on Friday to set up a tow of 40km to the Italian coast.

On Wednesday, the navy had already faced drama after it stopped another crewless “ghost” ship, the Blue Sky M, that was left drifting with nearly 800 migrants on board.

Italian authorities told reporters passengers on the Ezadeen had each paid 3300 to 6600 euros ($4,950 to $9,900) for the journey to Europe.

The passengers said they were flown from Lebanon to Turkey, where they set sail on December 31 aboard the ship that normally carries cattle.

According to the migrants, the crew members masked their faces throughout the journey, fuelling suspicions they may not actually have abandoned ship but mixed in among the migrants while awaiting rescue.

A female refugee raised the alarm over the ship’s radio, telling the coastguard that the crew had abandoned the vessel, coastguard spokesman Captain Filippo Marini said.

“We are alone, there is no one, help us!” Marini quoted her as saying.

An Icelandic patrol boat Tyr, which was in the area on a mission with the European Union’s border agency Frontex, came to the rescue but rough weather conditions made boarding the ship impossible.

After the vessel ran out of fuel, five Tyr crew members were winched onto the ship by helicopter to care for passengers until the Italian coastguard arrived to take control.

The appearance of two drifting migrant ships in under a week has raised concerns that smugglers have started abandoning large boatloads of people in European waters as a new tactic to maximise profits from their ruthless trade.

The Moldovan-registered Blue Sky M got within eight kilometres of running aground before six navy officers were lowered on to the ship by helicopter and succeeded in bringing it under control.

The passengers, who were said to be mainly Syrians and Kurds, included some 60 children and two pregnant women, one of whom gave birth on board, according to the Italian Red Cross.

More than 170,000 people have been rescued at sea by Italy in the last 14 months, and hundreds, possibly thousands, have perished trying to make the crossing.

A European Commission spokesman said Friday that fighting the smuggling of migrants would “continue to be a priority” of the EU in 2015.

news.com