Search on for Chinese national missing at sea off Cherating

Over 70 rescue personnel are battling high waves off the Cherating Beach to locate a Chinese national reported to have gone missing while swimming in the sea yesterday.

The personnel, in seven boats, one maritime vessel and a jet ski, are searching in an area up to three kilometres offshore for Peng Xiangyu, 31, of Jilin, China, said Gebeng Fire and Rescue Station chief Syed A. Jamaluddin Syed Mohamed.

Peng is an employee of an oil and gas company that has a contract in the Gebeng Industrial Estate, and had been staying at a beach resort for the past six months, he said to Bernama at the scene.

He had been swimming with a friend at about 5pm and was reportedly seen struggling in the water far out at sea, he said.

Syed A. Jamaluddin said the fire and rescue station sent a team of eight personnel to search for Peng after being notified at 5.26pm.

The search was resumed this morning and the team was expanded with 63 personnel from four agencies - the police, Royal Malaysia Navy, Civil Defence Force and the Malaysia Maritime Enforcement Agency - joining in, he said.

He also said that the area of the search, with the use of seven boats, one maritime vessel and a jet ski, was extended up to three kilometres from where Peng was believed to have gone missing.

"The search is made all the more difficult by the huge waves, of between three and five metres high, due to the monsoon season," he said.

Syed A. Jamaluddin advised the people against swimming in the sea off the east coast in the current monsoon season when the sea was rough. -- Bernama