At least 21 people were killed and five were missing after an Indonesian ferry carrying scores of wedding revellers capsized in rough seas, officials said yesterday.
There were 180 passengers aboard the Beringin Jaya when the boat flipped over on Thursday off the remote island of Kabaruang between Indonesia's Sulawesi island and the Philippines, Tahuna District Naval Base official Captain Zulkarnain said.
He said the latest information was "150 people survived, 21 were found dead, five are still missing, and four are being treated at a local hospital."
Police and navy estimates of the number on board had earlier ranged between 200 and 300.
"There were so many people on that boat, and many people jumped on even way after the ticket booth was closed," said Captain Alamsyah, a spokesman at the main North Sulawesi naval base in Manado city.
One navy source said a large party on board was going to a wedding on Kabaruang island, and that the boat capsized due to over-crowding.
Kabaruang is in the Sangihe Talaud archipelago, about 2,500km northeast of Jakarta.
A huge number of ferries ply the waters of Indonesia, the world's largest archipelago, and accidents, often caused by overcrowding or bad weather, occur periodically.
The number of passengers a ferry is registered to carry is often much less than the actual number on board.
The worst boat accident in recent years in Indonesia took place in June 2000 when an overcrowded vessel carrying almost 500 passengers, mostly refugees fleeing sectarian violence, sank in bad weather. Only 10 survived.
A beauty queen who pulled out of the Miss South Africa competition when her nationality was questioned has said she wants to relocate to Nigeria, after coming second in the Miss Universe pageant while representing the West African country. Chidimma Adetshina, whose father is Nigerian, was crowned Miss Universe Africa and Oceania and was runner-up to Denmark’s Victoria Kjar Theilvig in Mexico on Saturday night. The 23-year-old law student withdrew from the Miss South Africa competition in August, saying that she needed to protect herself and her family after the government alleged that her mother had stolen the identity of a South
BELT-TIGHTENING: Chinese investments in Cambodia are projected to drop to US$35 million in 2026 from more than US$420 million in 2021 At a ceremony in August, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet knelt to receive blessings from saffron-robed monks as fireworks and balloons heralded the breaking of ground for a canal he hoped would transform his country’s economic fortunes. Addressing hundreds of people waving the Cambodian flag, Hun Manet said China would contribute 49 percent to the funding of the Funan Techo Canal that would link the Mekong River to the Gulf of Thailand and reduce Cambodia’s shipping reliance on Vietnam. Cambodia’s government estimates the strategic, if contentious, infrastructure project would cost US$1.7 billion, nearly 4 percent of the nation’s annual GDP. However, months later,
HOPEFUL FOR PEACE: Zelenskiy said that the war would ‘end sooner’ with Trump and that Ukraine must do all it can to ensure the fighting ends next year Russia’s state-owned gas company Gazprom early yesterday suspended gas deliveries via Ukraine, Vienna-based utility OMV said, in a development that signals a fast-approaching end of Moscow’s last gas flows to Europe. Russia’s oldest gas-export route to Europe, a pipeline dating back to Soviet days via Ukraine, is set to shut at the end of this year. Ukraine has said it would not extend the transit agreement with Russian state-owned Gazprom to deprive Russia of profits that Kyiv says help to finance the war against it. Moscow’s suspension of gas for Austria, the main receiver of gas via Ukraine, means Russia now only
‘HARD-HEADED’: Some people did not evacuate to protect their property or because they were skeptical of the warnings, a disaster agency official said Typhoon Man-yi yesterday slammed into the Philippines’ most populous island, with the national weather service warning of flooding, landslides and huge waves as the storm sweeps across the archipelago nation. Man-yi was still packing maximum sustained winds of 185kph after making its first landfall late on Saturday on lightly populated Catanduanes island. More than 1.2 million people fled their homes ahead of Man-yi as the weather forecaster warned of a “life-threatening” effect from the powerful storm, which follows an unusual streak of violent weather. Man-yi uprooted trees, brought down power lines and smashed flimsy houses to pieces after hitting Catanduanes in the typhoon-prone
RSS