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Idul Fitri sea accidents: Three boats sink in bad weather
The BMKG has warned about high waves in some seas during the Idul Fitri holiday.
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Search and rescue team members examine maps to check the progress of a search in Banggai Laut waters off Sulawesi on June 17. (Antara/Basri Marzuki)
T
he National Search and Rescue Agency (Basarnas) was, as of June 7, still looking for 17 crew members of the KM Lintas Timur, a ship that sank on Saturday in the Banggai Sea off Central Sulawesi.
The head of the Daily Guard at the Basarnas headquarters, Abram Kolimon, said that on Friday morning the Air Force deployed an H 3213 Super Puma helicopter to search for the lost crew members from the air.
“We have found one of the crew members, but we are still searching for 17 others. The Super Puma will search from the air and our search and rescue team from Palu will try to find them from the water,” Abram told The Jakarta Post on Friday.
The only crew member, Yakub, 33, was found after four days adrift in the ocean. Yakub said, as quoted by Antara news agency, that the KM Lintas Timur left from Bitung Harbor in Manado, North Sulawesi on May 31 to head to Morowali, Central Sulawesi, carrying 3,000 sacks of cement and 18 crew members.
On Saturday the ship’s engine malfunctioned, which forced the crew members to head for the nearest harbor for repairs. After repairs were complete the crew continued on the journey but once again the engine cut out. That time all the systems went down.
Yakub said they tried to fix repair machine without success. Bad weather and big waves made them lose control of the ship.
“The captain then ordered all of us to abandon ship,” Yakub said on Friday.
