Drones strike two ships in Bulgaria's Black Sea zone, one sinks, crew missing

Drones struck two commercial ships in Bulgaria's exclusive economic zone in the Black Sea early on Tuesday, sinking one of them and leaving its crew missing, Bulgarian officials said.

The sunk vessel, the Togo-flagged Alfa Watan, went down in the Black Sea near Cape St Atanas and the town of Byala, roughly 70 nautical miles off the Bulgarian coast, according to ship-tracking data cited by Euronews. Bulgarian and Romanian rescue teams were sent to the area, and a search for the ship's missing crew was under way.

A fire broke out on the second ship, the Palau-flagged Able, after it was hit. All 18 crew members abandoned the vessel and were picked up by the Bulgarian ferry Dioscuria; some were injured and given first aid aboard the ferry before being taken to hospitals ashore, Czech outlet iDNES.cz reported.

Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev called an emergency meeting of officials from the defence, interior, transport and environment ministries, the presidential office and security services, Czech media reported. He was due to address the attack at a press conference later on Tuesday.

Bulgarian shipping news site Maritime.bg said the strikes appeared coordinated but that it was not yet clear who carried them out or where the drones were launched from. Bulgarian media described it as the first known drone attack on vessels inside the country's exclusive economic zone.

The attack came a day after a Turkish-owned cargo ship carrying Ukrainian grain was hit by a drone in the Black Sea near Romania's coast and later sank after catching fire, killing two people and leaving eleven rescued. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that ship was struck by two Russian drones while carrying corn from the Ukrainian port of Izmail.