Locals paid their respects to victims with a flower-throwing ceremony, while Simalungun Regent Jopinus Ramli Saragih said the administration would construct a monument to commemorate the victims of the incident at Tigaras Harbor.

“We officially withdrew around noon.,” said Medan Search and Rescue Agency head Budiawan as reported by kompas.com on Tuesday.

The joint team, consisting of personnel from the National Search and Rescue Agency (Basarnas) and the Navy, has recovered 21 survivors and three bodies, however 164 passengers remain missing.

The joint SAR team detected last Thursday the exact location of the remains of the boat that might also be the potential location of the missing victims, however, it hesitated to retrieve them to avoid the risk of destroying the victims' bodies.

 

“We can pull them out but the corpses might get destroyed,” Jopinus told the families of victims during a discussion on Saturday as reported by tribunnews.com.

Celebrity-cum-activist Ratna Sarumpaet weighed in on the issue when she interrupted a public forum at Tigaras Harbor on Monday. She demanded that Coordinating Maritime Affairs Minister Luhut Pandjaitan, who was speaking at the forum, continue the search efforts.

Budiawan said North Sumatra’s water police and navy would continue patrolling the lake. (nor/ebf)