Authorities are searching for more than 30 people who went missing after a passenger ship sank off the coast of Vanuatu. The incident, which occurred on Friday, has claimed at least two lives.
Details of the Incident
Searchers continued on Tuesday, finding no bodies or survivors from the sea or nearby shores on Monday near the site of the MV Matui shipwreck. According to local media, two bodies and 14 survivors were found over the weekend.
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Vanuatu's Deputy Police Commissioner, David Bongeranly, announced on Tuesday that the total number of people on board the ship was 53.
Questions About the Shipwreck
The circumstances of the shipwreck, including the timing, were unclear on Tuesday. Vanuatu police stated that they had not received any reports of the ship being missing 22 hours after it sank.
The Daily Post Vanuatu reported that the ship did not have permission to carry more than 30 people and had set sail on Friday without notifying the country's maritime safety authorities. The media also reported that the company owning the ship had been removed from Vanuatu's business registry in June.
Tui Shipping, the owner of the ship, issued a statement expressing sympathy for the victims and acknowledging its responsibility for passenger safety. The statement did not provide details about the shipwreck.
Prime Minister Jotham Napuat's office announced on social media on Tuesday that he would cancel his planned trip to the United Nations General Assembly in New York to address this crisis.
Napuat stated, “Many questions have been raised publicly that need answers and solutions.” He also noted that this situation could have been minimized or prevented if all responsible organizations had been on standby and fulfilled their duties.
On Sunday, Napuat suggested that the sinking might have been due to “negligence including overloading the ship” as well as ignoring maritime warnings. The country's meteorological services had issued warnings about strong winds and rough seas on the day the ship set sail.
This incident has been described as a “tragedy” and an “accident,” but Napuat did not use the term “sinking.” Reports from local media refer to the ship sinking.
On Sunday, the maritime search and rescue agency from the neighboring country, New Caledonia, announced that it was coordinating aerial and maritime searches for bodies and survivors. This agency has reported the number of missing individuals as 37.
Vanuatu is an archipelago consisting of 83 islands in the South Pacific, located about 1,750 kilometers (1,090 miles) east of Australia.
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Source: abcnews.com
