HANOI, VIETNAM (BNO NEWS) -- A Vietnamese sailor was found alive on Friday after his cargo ship sank off the coast of Vietnam on Sunday, killing nearly two dozen people, officials said.

The English MV London Courage ship found 31-year-old Dau Ngoc Hung adrift in a life boat on Friday, five days after the Vinalines Queen capsized after it passed the Filipino island of Luzon, which is located east of Vietnam.

Nguyen Anh Vu, the director of the Vietnam Maritime Search and Rescue Co-ordination Center, told the Vietnam News Agency that Hung is the only surviving crew member of the 23 people who worked on the ill-fated ship.

The accident occurred last Sunday on Christmas Day when the Vinalines Queen went missing while transporting 54,000 tonnes of Nikel from Indonesia to China. The ship did not send out a distress signal, slowing down rescue operations.

Hung said the boat suddenly overturned and quickly sank, explaining that he was the only one of the crew members who was able to reach a life boat. Search and rescue operations were carried out by different teams from the Philippines, Japan and Taiwan, as well as a number of other countries, which have already been informed of the rescue.

The cause of the accident remains unknown.

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