An abandoned German sailing boat which may have drifted as far as 1,000 miles across the Atlantic was towed into Bermuda by marine Police last night.

The 40-foot long vessel — called Corrina Frederika — was spotted by the bulk carrier UBC Saiki about 30 miles west-north-west of the Island.

Crew from the carrier boarded the boat and found nobody on it. They alerted Bermuda Maritime Operations Centre (BMOC), which contacted marine authorities in Bremen, Germany and discovered that the vessel was abandoned in the mid-Atlantic in July.

A duty officer at BMOC said the boat must have drifted towards Bermuda and could have travelled as many as 1,000 miles. He said the marine Police boat Guardian towed it into Soncy Bay in Fairylands just before 7 p.m. last night.

The spokesman said he did not know what would happen to the boat now. "As far as we know the parties in Germany are not interested in it. I believe marine Police are going to contact the owners."

He said it was not an offence to abandon a boat if those on board were in distress.

"It looks like this boat had capsized a lot of times," he added. "It was in very, very bad condition.

"For us to leave it out there would be a danger to any other yachts or ships coming this way."