10 South Africans on Bahrain ship
2006-03-31 06:54
Manama - At least 48 people died when a leisure boat with at least 150 passengers on board - among them 10 South Africans - sank off the coast of Bahrain late on Thursday as the coast guard and the US Navy worked frantically to rescue survivors.
"The number of survivors is 63, of which 12 were wounded, and the number of bodies that we have pulled out so far is 48," Colonel Yussef al-Ghatim told reporters.
"The organiser of the trip said 150 people were invited but some 14 to 20 may have gotten off before it sailed."
The number had earlier been put at 180 passengers.
Ghatim said most of those on board were Asians and Europeans, along with some Arab nationals, who worked for a private Bahraini company that had chartered the traditional boat known locally as a "Banoosh" for an evening dinner and cruise off the coast of the tiny Gulf island kingdom.
Bahrain's Information Minister Mohammed Abdul Ghaffar told CNN and Al-Arabiya new channels that 25 Britons, 20 Filipinos, 10 Egyptians, 10 South Africans and a number Bahrainis were on board.
He ruled out terror as a reason for the disaster.
Earlier Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid bin Abdullah al-Khalifa blamed the catastrophe on a technical failure.
"There must have been technical reasons that caused the accident. We met some of the survivors and they spoke about their surprise about the boat's capsize," he said on state television.
The accident happened at about 18:45 about a kilometre south of the Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman bridge, which links the capital Manama with the smaller Al-Muharraq island.
Ambulances rushed to the coastal guard base at Muharraq and speed boats were combing the sea looking to rescue passengers.
Bodies wrapped in white sheets were transported on stretchers off the rescue boats.
Prime minister Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman al-Khalifa was shown on state television comforting distraught survivors brought to the Muharraq base.
US Navy divers were sent to the scene to assist in the search and rescue of survivors, a navy official said.
The navy was using helicopters and small boats to get to the site, he added.
Bahrain is home to the US Navy's Fifth Fleet. It is a "major non-NATO ally" of the United States and has a free trade agreement with Washington.
The monarchy is an archipelago of 35 islands ruled by the Sunni Muslim Al-Khalifa dynasty. It has 650 000 a population, of whom 450 000 are Bahrainis.
Bahrain, which has negligible oil reserves, is the leading banking center in the Gulf, and the main base of Islamic banking in the region.
- SAPA