Survivors of boat accident arrive in North Sumatra

The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Fri, 10/03/2008 5:35 PM | National

The bodies of 12 people killed in a boat accident in Malaysian waters Tuesday arrived at Teluk Nibung seaport, North Sumatra, on Friday along with 103 survivors, Antara reported.

The victims, consisting of 80 men, 22 women and a 14-month-old baby boy, arrived at the seaport at 2 p.m. local time.

The victims were migrant workers from North Sumatra, Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam, Riau, Java and Kalimantan.

Meanwhile, the 12 dead, all of them women, included four residents of Sampit, West Kalimantan, one from Java and another from Sumatra. Six of them have not been identified yet.

The survivors and bodies were picked up at the Malaysian port city of Port Klang on Thursday by an Indonesian ship, the Sarotama, on instruction from the Indonesian Transportation Ministry.

They were part of a group of around 150 Indonesians who had boarded a barge that was to take them to Tanjung Balai in Sumatra for the Idul Fitri holidays. None of them had proper immigration documents.

The barge departed from a spot in a mangrove swamp near Che Mat Zin Island near West Port in Malaysia but it sank 10 minutes later at 7:30 a.m. in waters near Pintu Gedong or about 15
kilometers from West Port.

Twelve drowned, 125 others survived and three went missing.

An oil tanker and a tugboat that happened to pass the scene of the accident rescued a number of the survivors.

Maritime police believe the accident was most likely caused by being overloaded. (dre)

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