The Mercantile Marine Office of the Department of Shipping formed a three-member committee to investigate the fire incident in Saint Martin-bound luxury cruise ship MV Bay-1 on Friday midnight.

Giashuddin Ahmed, principal officer of the Mercantile Marine Office, told UNB on Saturday.

The committee was formed with  Captain Sheikh Md Jalal Uddin Gazi, Nautical Surveyor, as its head, he said adding the committee has been asked to submit a report within the next three days.

The other two members of the committee are Rafiqul Alam, engineer and ship surveyor and Mohammad Hossain, field unit coordinator of the Department of Shipping.

Read: Cruise ship stuck in mid sea 'safely returned'

The committee head said the report will be submitted after completing the survey and will make recommendations after identifying the reason of the accident.

Earlier on Friday, nearly two hours after the ship leaving the Patenga terminal in Chattogram carrying around 800 passengers to the island was forced to anchor mid sea as the crews noticed thick smoke in the engine room.

The crew of the ship managed to shut the engine and control  the fire within half an hour and fortunately none of the passengers were harmed.

Later , a tugboat named Kandari-10 managed to drag the ship with passengers to shore from 17 nautical miles away from Patenga.