A NUMBER OF Donegal fishermen have been rescued after their boat sank off the coast of Scotland overnight.

The Sainte Catherine Laboure, a 25-metre trawler based out of Greencastle on the Inishowen Peninsula, went down just before 11pm last night.

The boat is owned by MCD Trawling Ltd and was fishing for haddock near the Rockall Bank off the Scottish Outer Hebrides at the time.

The crew of six of the Irish vessel got into difficulty and began taking on water before activating the emergency position-indicating radio beacon.

The crew managed to scramble onto a life raft vessel.

The alert was picked up by the UK Coastguard and the Marine Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC) helped issue an alert to other vessels.

Luckily, a Scottish fishing vessel, the Good Hope, was in the area and managed to recover the crew from the stricken vessel before it sank.

The Scottish Fishery Patrol Vessel JURA, which was also in the area, stayed alongside the stricken trawler until it finally sank.

The skipper and the crew are now being transported to Ullapool in Scotland by the Good Hope to be assessed but none are understood to require medical attention.