The vessel, said to have been abandoned by the crew, is floating 65km off Capo di Leuca, the tip of Italy's heel, the air force said in a statement on Thursday.
"Because of the difficult weather conditions the ship can only be boarded from the air," the statement said.
The ship was identified as the 60-metre-long Sierra Leone-registered Ezadeen.
Prior to losing power, the ship had been moving at a brisk seven knots and had been spotted by a coastguard plane 130km offshore shortly after nightfall.
One of the people on board the Ezadeen was able to operate the ship's radio and informed the coastguard that the crew had jumped ship.
The coastguard asked for assistance from Icelandic patrol boat Tyr, which was in the area on a mission with Frontex, the European Union's border agency.
The Tyr was able to draw alongside the runaway ship, but the weather conditions made boarding impossible.
The Icelandic vessel has three doctors on board who will be winched on to the merchant ship by helicopter to treat any unwell passengers, the air force said.
Pregnant women
The latest high-seas drama came two days after Italian sailors intercepted a freighter carrying more than 700 mostly Syrian migrants which had been heading for the rocks of Italy's southeastern shore on autopilot.
The vessel had been abandoned by the people smugglers who had navigated it from Turkey via Greek waters.
In that incident, the Moldovan-registered Blue Sky M cargo ship got to within 8km, or 45 minutes sailing time, of a disaster before six navy officers were lowered on to the ship by helicopter and succeeded in bringing it under control.
Those on board included 60 children and two pregnant women, one of whom gave birth on board as the boat steamed towards catastrophe, according to the Italian Red Cross.
Many of the migrants on the ship were treated for hypothermia and broken limbs.
[aljazeera.com]
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La Guardia Costiera prende il comando del mercantile con 450 migranti e dirige verso il porto di Crotone....
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