MMEA director-general Mohd Zubil Mat Som said the agency had received a report from an Indonesian shipping company that a ship had lost its tow rope while towing the Winposh Rampart, which was without a crew, at about 3.15pm on Monday.

He said the two ships were in Vietnamese waters about 120 nautical miles from Kuala Terengganu, while en route from Matak, Indonesia, to Yang Pu in China.

The tow rope snapped because of bad weather and the Winposh Rampart then drifted into Malaysian waters.

“The risk assessment analysis found that the Winposh Rampart could potentially collide with Petronas’ Telok A oil rig and cause it to explode and trigger a life-threatening incident if no swift measures were taken to deal with it,” Zubil said in a statement yesterday.

MMEA then worked with Petronas to tow the ship to a safer location.

He said the ship was being towed to the Kemaman supply base in Terengganu, a journey expected to take almost 65 hours.