Ghana Navy rescues seven stowaways hidden in tanker’s rudder compartment off Tema coast
The Ghana Navy has rescued seven suspected Ivorian stowaways found concealed inside one of the most hazardous spaces aboard a vessel — the rudder trunk of a Belgian-registered crude oil tanker — in a maritime operation carried out approximately 200 nautical miles south of Tema Harbour.
Commodore Solomon Asiedu-Larbi, Flag Officer Commanding the Eastern Naval Command, disclosed the details of the operation at a press conference at the Naval Base in Tema, revealing that the rescue was triggered by a distress alert relayed to Ghana’s Maritime Operations Centres by the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre in Abidjan on Wednesday, May 13, 2026.
The vessel in question, MT Cap Felix, a Belgian-flagged tanker with a gross tonnage of approximately 82,000 tonnes, had reported that individuals were hiding inside its rudder trunk and requested urgent assistance.
The rudder trunk is a confined steering compartment located directly above a ship’s propeller — among the most dangerous areas imaginable for a person to occupy.
Ghana Navy Ship Achimota was dispatched from Tema Harbour at around 19:00 hours on Wednesday and intercepted the tanker at sea. Naval personnel successfully extracted all seven male suspects from the compartment and transported them safely back to Tema Harbour.
Preliminary investigations identified all seven as nationals of Côte d’Ivoire, though they were said to belong to a Ghanaian community resident in that country.
They are believed to have boarded the tanker clandestinely while it was anchored in Abidjan, the vessel’s last official port of call, before the ship set sail.
Despite the extreme conditions inside the rudder compartment, all seven individuals were found to be in good health.
They have since been handed over to the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority, the Ghana Immigration Service, and the Marine Police for further investigations and potential legal proceedings.
Commodore Asiedu-Larbi commended maritime stakeholders for their swift information sharing and reaffirmed the Ghana Navy’s commitment to protecting the country’s maritime domain and the broader Gulf of Guinea from piracy, illegal migration, and other transnational threats.
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