Finnish cruise ship evacuated

STOCKHOLM: A Finnish passenger cruise ship ran aground off the island of Aland in the Baltic Sea, the cruise line said on Sunday, with emergency services adding they were preparing to evacuate the vessel.

The ship was headed towards Stockholm from Turku in Finland and ran aground around 12:50 am local time (0950 GMT) outside the city of Mariehamn on the autonomous Finnish island of Aland near the Swedish coast.

“There are no personal injuries and no one’ s life is in danger, and the situation aboard is stable,” Eleonora Hansi, head of information for Viking Line Scandinavia, told AFP. The ship, Amorella, is 169 metres long and does daily trips between Stockholm in Sweden and Turku in Finland.