Search for a semi-submerged Russian ship, the Kapella, began in the Tatar Strait near the Sakhalin port city of Nevelsk early on Monday.
The tugboat Topaz, arriving from Vladivostok, conducts the search. Late on Thursday, the Kapella collided with an Italian ship, got a hole of about five square meters, listed to port but did not sink.
According to the sea rescue center in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, its board is rising four meters above the water level. The Kapella presents major threat for the navigation in the north of the Sea of Japan, and rescuers keep sending warning signals to ships.