The injured captain of a stricken cargo ship off the southern Irish coast was airlifted to safety on Saturday and taken to hospital in Cornwall, south-west England, coastguards said, according to dpa. A Royal Navy helicopter airlifted the man and another six passengers, including two injured, off the Horncliff. An earlier rescue effort had to be aborted Friday night owing to gales. The freighter was carrying 130 containers of bananas and other fruit, large parts of which went overboard in the heavy seas. However, the ship was able to continue its voyage. The cargo ship was travelling under a Liberian flag from Costa Rica to Dover, south-east England, when it encountered a force-10 storm around 300 kilometres off southern Ireland on Friday. During the storm the captain sustained serious spinal and internal injuries. The coastguard warned of the dangers of floating cargo containers. Already on Friday, crew and passengers had to be rescued from two ships - a ferry off the coast of Blackpool, north-west England, and a fishing trawler off the remote island of St Kilda, west of Scotland. The ferry on Saturday still remained in the shallow waters off the coast. In Scotland, the National Trust conservation body, meanwhile, has warned that rats from the trawler might get into the island's conservation area and destroy the environment and rare birds. "Rats on St Kilda would really matter, because the islands are one of the most important sea bird stations in the north east Atlantic," Susan Bain of the National Trust told BBC radio. Thousands of homes across Britain were still without electricity on Saturday after heavy snowfall and gale-force winds had severely hit the country, but the weather was expected to ease. Blizzards hit the north of England and Scotland on Friday causing chaos on the roads, bringing down trees and leaving people stranded. Less biting weather was expected Saturday, although severe weather warnings had been issued for most of Britain. Hundreds of motorists, including a group of 40 pensioners, had to be rescued late on Friday night after being left stranded on the remote A66 road in County Durham, northern England. In the North-East and North Yorkshire, 6,000 homes were left without electricity after falling trees and debris damaged overhead power lines.
