On Monday, rescuers reported that a passenger vessel capsized off the coast of Indonesia's Sulawesi island, killing at least 15 people and leaving 19 others missing.
The ferry sank at approximately midnight (16:00 GMT) with 40 passengers on board, according to Indonesia's national search and rescue agency, which reported on Monday that 19 persons remain missing.
Indonesia Sulawesi Island Tragedy
The agency reported that six passengers were rescued and treated in a hospital. It is common in Indonesia for the actual number of passengers on a vessel to differ from the number listed on the manifest.
In Indonesia, the world's largest archipelago nation with more than 17,000 islands, ferry catastrophes are common, according to Al Jazeera. In May of last year, a ferry carrying over 800 passengers ran aground off the coast of East Nusa Tenggara province. Nobody was injured during the incident.
The vessel capsized shortly after midnight on Monday while traveling from Lanto village in Buton Central regency in Southeast Sulawesi province to adjacent Lagili village, according to the director of the local search and rescue agency, Muhammad Arafah.
Per SCMP, the wooden boat was transporting forty passengers despite being designed for only twenty. The cause remained unknown. On Monday, rescuers were searching for 19 people still missing in stormy seas, while 15 bodies had been recovered and six people had been rescued, according to Arafah.
On Muna island, approximately 200 kilometers (124 miles) south of Kendari, the provincial capital of Southeast Sulawesi, the vessel carried passengers across a distance of just 1 kilometer (less than half a mile). The trip between two minor villages opposite Mawasangka Bay was expected to take only 20 minutes.
On Sunday, thousands of residents traveled to their villages to celebrate the ninth anniversary of the regency, with many using fishing or passenger vessels. The obscure pleasures of more than 40 hours on an overcrowded Indonesian ferry
March 19, 2023
Bodies Retrieved After Indonesia Boat Capsized
The television news showed images of people on fishing vessels retrieving bodies in the darkness of the night, as well as sorrowful relatives waiting for information at a port and a local hospital. The rescue agency stated that teams seeking the missing were diving at the site where the vessel sank and patrolling nearby waters in inflatable boats.
In Indonesia, where there are more than 17,000 islands, ferries are a prevalent mode of transportation. Due to lackadaisical safety standards and overcrowding issues, incidents occur frequently.
In 2018, an overcrowded ferry carrying approximately 200 people capsized in a lake in the province of North Sumatra, murdering 167 people. In one of the nation's worst recorded catastrophes, a passenger ship carrying 332 persons sank in February 1999. Twenty individuals survived.
