DOZENS DEAD AS FERRY BURNS
Indonesia tourist vessel catches fire after engine room explosion,
JAKARTA // Twenty-three people were killed and more were feared dead after fire broke out on a boat carrying hundreds of tourists to an island north of the Indonesian capital yesterday. Passengers panicked and jumped into the sea as flames and smoke engulfed the Zahro Express shortly after it left Jakarta for the popular holiday island of Tidung, the national disaster agency said.
Another 17 people were missing and 194 were rescued following the blaze, which started with an explosion in the engine room that the transport min- istry said was accidental and could have been caused by an electrical fault.
Rescuers reported 17 people were injured.
“Fifteen minutes after the boat set sail, people at the back of the boat started making noise,” a female passenger told local station Metro TV.
“Then I saw smoke, there was more and more, the boat was crowded and people were fighting for life jackets.”
Another survivor said someone took her son’s life jacket as he was about to jump from the boat. “When we wanted to go, I panicked because I saw my son jump off the boat without a [life jacket] because somebody else had taken it,” she said. Passing fishermen rescued many of the passengers, all of whom were believed to be Indo- nesians and firefighting boats were deployed to put out the blaze.
After the fire was extinguished, the boat returned to port and rescuers searched through the remains of the vessel, which had been heading to the island 50 kilometres from the capital and part of the Thousand Islands archipelago. Government rescue vessels scoured the sea for survivors.
A manifest indicated there were 100 passengers on the ferry but as rescuers plucked passengers from the vessel it became apparent the figure was far higher in a country where overcrowding on boats is common.
“The manifest says there are around 100 people on board, but that’s wrong, so we are still searching,” said disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Nugroho.
The agency said that the tour- ists were likely to have been heading to Tidung to celebrate the New Year. The Thousand Islands, many of which are just a couple of hours by boat from Jakarta, are a popular weekend getaway for residents of the teeming, overcrowded capital of more than 10 million inhabitants.
Fatal boat accidents are common in Indonesia, which relies on boats to ferry people round its 17,000 islands.
In September a tourist boat on the resort island of Bali exploded, killing two foreigners.
Fifty-four people died in November when an overcrowded boat carrying three crew and 98 passengers – mostly Indonesian migrant workers – struck a reef and sank on its way from Malaysia to Batam.