A fishing boat has reached the cruise ship adrift in the Indian Ocean with more than 1,000 people on board, officials say. The Costa Allegra suffered a fire in its generator room that caused it to lose power south-west of the Seychelles - an area where pirates are active. It has no lights or air-conditioning and an emergency generator providing communications "could fail at any minute", the Italian coast guard says. Tugs are still some hours away. The ship is from the same fleet as the Costa Concordia, which capsized off the Italian coast in January, killing 32. Commander Cosimo Nicastro from the Italian coast guard told the BBC that the trawler - a French-registered ocean-going boat - could now maintain communications with rescue vessels if the ship's emergency battery failed. "At any moment we could lose communication because the emergency battery could stop at any second," he said. "The first step is to keep communications with the ship." He said agencies involved in the rescue operation would reassess the situation when day breaks. Continue reading the main story Nationalities of passengers 135 Italians 127 French 97 Austrians 90 Swiss 38 Germans 31 Britons List of nationalities in full The ship's owner, Costa Cruises, has stressed that the Allegra is steady and conditions are safe. It says it is liaising with passengers' families via their emergency contact numbers, and has reached two-thirds of them. Contact has been made with the relatives of all the crew. Families in the UK can call the company's emergency line on 0207 940 3300.
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