Philippine Ferry Fire Kills 35; 54 Still Missing
Philippine Ferry Fire Kills 35; 54 Still Missing
The News
Editor's note: reporting drawn from The Independent and The Guardian coverage of the Philippine coast guard's briefings.
At least 35 people are dead and 54 remain unaccounted for after a fast-moving fire destroyed the passenger ferry MV June Aster off the western Philippine province of Palawan on Wednesday evening.
Thirty charred bodies recovered from inside the ship arrived Saturday at the Port of Borac in Coron for identification, the Philippine coast guard said, and officials said more bodies are still inside the wreck.
Coast guard spokeswoman Commodore Noemie Cayabyab said authorities are looking for the ship's captain, who reportedly survived but is not listed among the survivors.
The Numbers
The manifest listed 134 people aboard — 117 passengers and 17 crew — but two listed passengers told authorities they never boarded, leaving 132 on the ship, the coast guard said. There were 43 survivors.
The 53-meter (174-foot) vessel was licensed to carry 306 passengers and 27 crew.
Timeline
Fire is reported aboard the MV June Aster, which had sailed from Manila and was off the village of Turda, some 39 kilometers (24 miles) from its destination, the Port of Coron. A survivor said the blaze may have started in the cargo hold; officials said survivors recounted hearing a blast, with smoke and fire spreading quickly and fanned by the winds.
Intense heat and heavy smoke severely hinder rescue workers, delaying the search for anyone trapped inside. Coast guard images show the ship's blackened interior — ashes, warped metal, a destroyed car and what appeared to be human remains.
The death toll rises to 35 as more bodies are recovered. Authorities say at least 54 people are still unaccounted for.
Thirty bodies arrive at the Port of Borac in Coron, Palawan province, where tents were set up and body bags were brought down from the ship that carried them from the burned ferry. The coast guard says retrieval operations will continue.
Reactions
"The fire quickly spread. That's when I dropped to the ground and my back was burned," survivor Arnulfo Nokki Villanueva said in a video broadcast by News5, describing how he jumped from a window. "I wanted to get a life jacket but failed to get one because people were stepping on me. People were in panic."
"It's painful to think that your child was asking for help while she was burning alive," said Lira Daco, who waited at a rescue center in Turda for word about her missing 20-year-old daughter, Cyriel. "I don't know how we can find out which one is my child," she said of the remains found inside the ship. "It's ok if she just drowned and we can recover her body and give her a proper burial. But now we can't recognize or hug her."
Cayabyab said survivors described an event that happened so fast there was no time to get life jackets. A tarpaulin that shielded the ship's open areas from the rain "may be a possible contributing factor but we can't determine now if they were trapped inside," she said.
Atienza Interisland Ferries Inc., the ship's owner, said in a statement it was assisting those who were on board and their families while coordinating with the coast guard and maritime officials to locate the missing and determine the cause of the fire.
What's Next
Retrieval operations continue, with the coast guard saying more bodies remain inside the MV June Aster without giving a count. The recovered bodies will be turned over to the local government, with police assisting in identifying the charred remains.
The cause of the fire has not been determined. Cayabyab said multiagency maritime safety and criminal investigations will look into all angles, including the possible liability of the captain and crew.
Investigators will also check whether fire emergency procedures were followed — including whether the captain sounded an alarm or gave warnings and instructions, and whether the crew assisted passengers.
More
Two of the survivors were tourists from Chile, according to Rachel Conserman, a staffer at Atienza Interisland Ferries. They were treated for injuries in Coron, and the coast guard said the foreigners have since left the town and that authorities coordinated with their embassy.
Coron is a popular tourist destination known for its clear blue waters, limestone cliffs and rock formations.
Ferries are a common form of transport across the Philippine archipelago, and sea accidents are not uncommon there because of storms, badly maintained vessels, overcrowding and spotty enforcement of safety rules, especially in remote island provinces. In 1987, the ferry Dona Paz sank after colliding with a fuel tanker in the central Philippines, killing more than 4,300 people in the world's deadliest peacetime maritime disaster.
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