Norman Atlantic death toll hits five as dozens arrive on land

BARI, Italy — Helicopters defied high winds, stormy seas and darkness Monday to pluck hundreds of passengers from a Greek ferry that caught fire off Albania, as survivors told of a frantic rush to escape the flames and pelting rain. Five people died and dozens remained trapped on board a day after the fire broke out.

Exhausted and cold from their ordeal, 49 passengers reached land Monday in the southern Italian port of Bari, more than 24 hours after fire broke out on a car deck of the ferry making a journey from the Greek port of Patras to Ancona in Italy.

By mid-Monday, fewer than 100 people remained stranded on the smoke-filled vessel adrift in frigid temperatures and rough seas near the Albanian coast. Helicopters worked night and day plucking passengers off the stricken vessel and ferrying them to 10 or so mercantile ships nearby that were summoned to help.

One Greek man died on Sunday after becoming trapped in a lifeboat chute. Greek Coast Guard spokesman Nikos Lagadianos said four more people were found dead on Monday. Four-hundred-seventy-eight passengers and crew were on board when the ferry caught fire.

A Greek truck driver, reached by The Associated Press aboard one of the rescue vessels, described the rescue scene as “a chaos, a panic.” He said the fire alarm came after most passengers, alerted by smoke filling their cabins, had gone outside, and that there was no crew in sight to direct passengers.

“Our feet were burning and from the feet up we were soaked,” Christos Perlis, 32, told the AP by telephone.

When rescue helicopters arrived, Perlis said passengers began to panic.

“Everyone there was trampling on each other to get onto the helicopter,” said Perlis, who said he and another man tried to impose order.<...