Update, 5 November 2026: The 14 Filipino crew of Contship Jet arrived home in the Philippines on 2 November 2026. The Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) said they landed at Clark International Airport on Qatar Airways flight QR926 from Doha. OWWA Regional Welfare Office III met them at the airport and said it was ready to give post-repatriation help. The four Ukrainian crew are not covered by this Philippine report.
Update, 29 October 2026 (later): Bulgaria published the position of the wreck. Navigation warning NAVWARN 768/26 says Contship Jet sank at 20:30 UTC on 28 October. The position is 43°07.80′N 028°45.36′E, southeast of Cape Kaliakra. More than 20 containers from the ship are still adrift in the area. The warning says the wreck and the containers are an immediate danger to navigation. It advises extreme caution.
Update, 29 October 2026: Contship Jet sank late on 28 October, about 10 hours after the attack. The regional administration in Varna announced this. Vessel Traffic Control and the Maritime Administration confirmed it, the news agency BTA reports. All 18 crew are safe in Varna.
The ship sank in the night
After the drones hit, sea water came into the ship and it started to lean. It drifted south with no one on board, Bulgarian media report. Bulgarian officials first said it sank around midnight. The official navigation warning gives the time as 20:30 UTC on 28 October. That is 22:30 Bulgarian time. The wreck lies about 7 nautical miles south of the place where the drones hit the ship.
About 20 of the 421 containers fell into the water after the attack, the Bulgarian Navy says. Some of the cargo is fuel and other dangerous goods. The Environment Ministry saw no pollution at first. It will test sea water at five places on the coast. After the sinking, the risk from the ship's fuel and cargo is still not clear, Fakti.bg reports.
The crew are safe ashore, and the Filipinos are home
The 18 seafarers are 14 Filipinos and 4 Ukrainians. They came to Varna on the navy rescue ship Proteo on the evening of 28 October. Rear Admiral Kiril Mihaylov, head of the Bulgarian Navy, said they arrived unharmed, the TV station BNT reports. Doctors were ready to check them. The Greek shipowner booked a hotel for them through its local agent.
The Filipino crew stayed in a hotel in Varna while Bulgarian authorities interviewed them. A staff member of the Migrant Workers Office (MWO) in Hungary went to Varna to meet them and to arrange financial help, earlier DMW reports said. On 2 November they flew home via Doha to Clark International Airport, OWWA confirmed through The Manila Times.
The DMW also gave the crew's own account. The seafarers said the captain told them to jump into the water right after the first drone hit. They said they were in the water for about two to three hours before rescuers reached them. This is different from the Bulgarian account below, which says some crew were in a lifeboat.
Admiral Mihaylov said a French Navy patrol plane first saw two sea drones, and later a third. The plane warned ships in the area on VHF channel 16 that drones were coming. "The crew was warned, and I think this helped a lot so that there were no victims and everyone was rescued," he said, according to BNT.
The drones moved at about 26 knots, the admiral said. They made three holes in the side of the ship. Reports differ on which side was hit. He said he could not say where the drones came from.
Containers with dangerous goods in the water
Bulgaria issued navigation warning NAVWARN 761/26 on 28 October. It says that at 12:00 UTC, more than 20 containers from the ship were drifting southeast of Cape Kaliakra, near 43°15.20′N 028°48.50′E. The warning says they hold flammable gases, non-flammable gases, flammable liquids and other dangerous goods. It calls them a danger to navigation. UTC is Coordinated Universal Time, two hours behind Bulgarian time. The newer warning NAVWARN 768/26 says the containers are still adrift near the wreck. It lists the same kinds of dangerous goods.
The shipping site Maritime.bg reports that the cargo included lithium-ion batteries, acids and other corrosive liquids, and flammable goods. It is still not known exactly what was in each container that fell into the sea, the newspaper Standart reports.
If you sail near Cape Kaliakra
Read the newest Bulgarian navigation warnings before you pass the area. Drifting containers move with the wind and current.
Mark the wreck position from NAVWARN 768/26 on your chart: 43°07.80′N 028°45.36′E. Keep well clear of it.
Keep a sharp lookout by eye and by radar. A floating container can sit low in the water and is hard to see, especially at night.
Do not go close to a drifting container. Some containers may hold flammable gas or liquid, or batteries that can catch fire.
Report any container or floating wreckage you see to the nearest coast station on VHF channel 16, with its position.
Listen to VHF channel 16 at all times. On 28 October, a warning on that channel gave this crew time to get ready.
Three sea drones hit the container ship Contship Jet in the Black Sea on Wednesday, 28 October 2026. The ship was off northern Bulgaria. All 18 crew left the ship and were rescued, Bulgaria's Ministry of Transport says. No one was reported dead or missing.
A sea drone is a small boat with no crew, filled with explosives and steered from far away. It is not yet known who sent the drones. Ukraine blames Russia for earlier attacks of this kind, and Russia denies them, Reuters reports.
What happened
Contship Jet sails under the flag of Liberia. Its IMO number is 9348625. It was sailing from Haifa in Israel to Constanța in Romania. The crew told the authorities that it carried 421 containers. The ship manager gave Bulgarian media a higher figure of about 700.
Bulgaria's Defence Minister Dimitar Stoyanov said three sea drones hit the ship about 21 nautical miles southeast of Shabla. The Ministry of Transport puts the place about 17 nautical miles east of Cape Kaliakra. This is inside Bulgaria's exclusive economic zone, the sea area where Bulgaria has special rights.
Bulgarian media, quoting the shipping site Maritime.bg, reported that the ship was badly damaged and on fire. It stayed afloat for some hours, then sank late in the evening. Reuters reports that the owner and manager is Contships Management in Greece.
How the crew were rescued
The Ministry of Transport gives these times, in Bulgarian local time:
12:01: the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC) in Constanța, Romania, told Bulgaria that the ship was hit.
12:13: the crew left the ship. Bulgaria started a search and rescue operation.
Three Bulgarian Navy ships and one Border Police ship went to the area.
12:53: a navy boat took 8 seafarers on board. The other 10 were in the ship's lifeboat, and they were also picked up.
Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) said that while some crew were in a life raft, another drone was moving toward them. In the end, all 18 were rescued.
Bulgarian media report that the crew are 14 Filipinos and 4 Ukrainians. The navy rescue ship Proteo took them to the Sea Station in Varna. They arrived there in the evening. Border Police and medical teams were ready to meet them, the ministry says.
The ship manager told Maritime.bg: "All sailors from the crew of the CONTSHIP JET are safe. Thank you Bulgaria."
The fifth ship hit near Bulgaria this month
BNR says Contship Jet is the fifth ship hit by drones in Bulgaria's exclusive economic zone. Earlier attacks hit ABLE and Alfa Watan on 6 October, and HS Dignity and Chelsea 3 on 13 October, the newspaper 24 Chasa reports. Read our report on HS Dignity.
On 23 October, a drone hit the ship Khoryv off Romania. One crew member died and three are still missing. Read our report on Khoryv. Reuters says attacks on ships off Bulgaria have likely killed about two dozen seafarers in recent weeks. Our report on seafarer deaths in the Black Sea has more figures.
The attack happened during a meeting in Sofia of the defence ministers of Bulgaria, Romania and Türkiye. The three countries condemned the attacks on merchant ships. They agreed to share information and to set up early warning, BNR reports.
What it means for crews
If your ship sails in the western Black Sea, read the newest navigation warnings from Bulgaria and Romania before each passage.
Keep a sharp lookout by eye and radar for small, fast objects on the water. Report anything strange to the nearest MRCC on VHF channel 16.
Make sure everyone knows the abandon-ship plan. Check that lifeboats, life rafts and survival suits are ready.
Ask your company for its latest security advice for the area. Also check what your contract says about war-risk areas.
Filipino crew who need post-repatriation help after a war-risk incident can contact OWWA or their MWO. Keep copies of your contract and pay records.
Crewboard will update this post if the authorities publish new facts about the ship or the crew.
Cover photo: The cliffs of Cape Kaliakra on Bulgaria's northern Black Sea coast, July 2011. The attack happened at sea about 17 nautical miles east of the cape. Illustrative photo. Photo: Arkadiusz Markiewicz/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Sources: The Manila Times, 2 Nov 2026: 14 Filipino seafarers return home, Bulgarian Ministry of Transport, 28 Oct 2026: Contship Jet crew rescued, Radio Bulgaria (BNR), 28 Oct 2026: Container ship struck by three drones 21 nautical miles southeast of Shabla, BNT, 28 Oct 2026: Contship Jet crew arrived in Varna, Reuters via Yahoo News, 28 Oct 2026: Drones hit another container ship off Bulgaria, BTA / Marica.bg, 29 Oct 2026: Contship Jet has sunk, Bulgarian NAVWARN 761/26 and 768/26 via SeaLagom, The Filipino Times, 1 Nov 2026: 14 Filipino seafarers set to return home Nov. 2.
How we choose, write and correct our articles: editorial policy.
