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JAKARTA - A ship with about 200 passengers on board sank near Ambon island in central Indonesia, killing at least five people, officials said Monday. Ambon police spokesman Lt. Tony Sugadra said that emergency vessels and local fishermen picked up 127 survivors after the ferry went down late Sunday. About 80 of them were being treated at hospitals in the region.
Sugadra said the ship, which was heading for the town of Masohi on Seram island, had 105 paying passengers listed on the manifest. But police believe the actual number of passengers was closer to 200 and that overloading may have been a factor in the accident. Ambon is the capital and main island in the Maluku archipelago, 2,600 kilometers (1,600 miles) east of Jakarta. Seram, located about 150 kilometers (90 miles) northeast of Ambon, is the province's largest island.
Three navy ships joined the flotilla of boats searching Ambon bay for survivors, rescue officials said. Most of the passengers on board the inter-island ferry were believed to be heading home to Seram to celebrate this week's Muslim holiday marking the end of the Ramadan period of fasting. Shipping accidents are common in Indonesia, a vast archipelago where much traveling is done by boat. Safety regulations are often poorly enforced, and ship owners often claim they are unable to afford maintenance and repairs.
In June 2000, nearly 500 people drowned when a ferry sank off the coast of Sulawesi. A year ago, 374 people, mostly asylum-seekers from Afghanistan and Iraq, died when a refugee boat sank en route from Indonesia to Australia. -
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