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A Philippine Navy boat guards a cargo ship with its bow destroyed on August 17, 2013, after it collided with a ferry/ AFP

World

Two hundred missing in Philippine ferry disaster

Local fisherman Mario Chavez told AFP he was one of the first people to reach passengers after the ferry sank in the 82-metre-deep (270-feet) channel.

“I plucked out 10 people from the sea last night. It was pitch black and I only had a small flashlight. They were bobbing in the water and screaming for help,” he said.

“They told me there were many people still aboard when the ferry sank… there were screams, but I could not get to all of them.”

The cargo ship, Sulpicio Express 7, which had 36 crew members on board, did not sink. Television footage showed its steel bow had caved in on impact but it sailed safely to dock.

Tuason said it appeared one of the vessels had violated rules on which lanes they should use when travelling in and out of the port.

The enforcement office chief of the government’s Maritime Industry Authority, Arnie Santiago, said the strait leading into the Cebu port was a well-known danger zone.

“It is a narrow passage, many ships have had minor accidents there in the past. But nothing this major,” Santiago told AFP.

“There is a blind spot there and each ship passing through needs to give way in a portion of that narrow strip.”

The Thomas Aquinas was a “roll-on, roll-off” ferry, which allows vehicles to be driven aboard and is commonly used in the Philippines.

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Ferries are one of the main modes of transport across the archipelago of more than 7,100 islands, particularly for the millions of people too poor to fly.

But sea accidents are common, with poor safety standards and lax enforcement typically to blame.

The world’s deadliest peacetime maritime disaster occurred near the capital, Manila, in 1987 when a ferry laden with Christmas holidaymakers collided with a small oil tanker, killing more than 4,300 people.

In 2008, a huge ferry capsized during a typhoon off the central island of Sibuyan, leaving almost 800 dead.

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