Many missing as Jakarta plans to tow charred ferry
23 Feb 2007 03:50:45 GMT Source: Reuters
By Mita Valina Liem JAKARTA, Feb 23 (Reuters) - The Indonesian navy plans to tow a fire-gutted ferry from the Java Sea towards port on Friday, an officer said, amid confusion over how many passengers were on board and may still be missing. The official count from the sea accident remains 16 dead and 17 missing based on the manifest for the ferry, the Levina I, which says 307 people were on board. However, officials fear there were many stowaways on the ill-fated ship. "It is common for people who have no ticket to force their way on board using whatever way they find," said Lieutenant Colonel Hendra Pakan, spokesman of the Indonesian navy's western fleet that has deployed ships to rescue the passengers. "There is a plan to tow the boat today and (it) will be escorted by a navy ship," he said. The Levina I was on its way to Bangka island off Sumatra when it caught fire soon after dawn on Thursday 80 km (50 miles) from Jakarta's Tanjung Priok port. Officials said preliminary findings lead to the possibility the fire started from a truck with inflammable chemical cargo and spread throughout the ferry. SEARING HEAT Many of the passengers hurled themselves off the blazing vessel into the sea to escape the flames and searing heat. Heri Asmedi, an Indonesian Red Cross official, told Reuters most of the dead had wet clothes and no burns. He added that up until Friday morning, relatives were still looking for information on a total of 123 people. Some of them may have been saved without their rescue having been recorded and a number of them may not have been listed on the manifest. One of the first survivors brought back to Jakarta described panic when the crew told passengers the fire had broken out in the lower deck, loaded with motorcycles and cars. "It was dark. The first thing I did was look for a lifebuoy and then jumped into the sea. I saw someone jump without a lifebuoy who died," said the passenger, giving his name as Mursid. The ferry was 27 years old and built in Japan, transport ministry official Bobby Mamahit said. On Thursday, he believed only crew trying to fight the blaze were likely to have been on the lower decks, "so the possibility of passengers who were trapped in the ferry is small." Transport Minister Hatta Rajasa said it was too early to be clear on the cause of the blaze. Ferries are a popular means of transport among the 17,000 islands of Indonesia, where sea connections are cheaper and more available than air routes. But safety standards are not always strictly enforced and accidents occur fairly often. Overcrowding and bribing crew to get on board for less than the cost of a ticket are common on public sea and ground transport in Indonesia, a vast country of 220 million people and poor infrastructure.
