Fears rise for 287 missing after South Korean ferry sinks

Telling passengers to wait inside is absolutely ridiculous. Get them topside quickly in an orderly manner.

Looking at the ferry in question, I don't see many lifeboats. If there were liferafts, they'd be on the decks so they can presumably float off. There's no point to having them if people can't get to them.

A disaster made worse by stupidity.

The ferry sank so fast, so a big hole must be somewhere at bottom?

North Korean sleeper terrorist bomb? Just a thought.

Looks grim but let's hope they find lots more survivors.

The ferry sank so fast, so a big hole must be somewhere at bottom?

Reasons of disasters are well depicted. If a main gate on car deck is broken, the ship gets huge volume of sea water every minute. For instance, it occured with MV Estonia.

I think what made this tragedy worse was that this boat was an oceangoing car ferry--the same type of boat that caused the horrible disasters with the sinking of the MS Herald of Free Enterprise in 1987 and MS Estonia in 1994.

The problem with oceangoing car ferries is inside the boat are large open spaces used to hold motor vehicles. If the seawater starts flowing inside in a big way due to a hull breach, these large open spaces will fill up with seawater very quickly, which can sink the car ferry so fast that even if there is an orderly evacuation of passengers and crew to the lifeboats many won't make it before the ship actually capsizes and/or sinks.

Seems unlikely the ship struck an underwater object, from photo images, so some cause of hull breach is most likely.

A ship is capsizing and they were told not to go outside?? If the person who gave that order is still alive, then he/she must be held accountable for this horrible tragedy turned worse thanks to this idiot. Please let there be more survivors...

The Yukan Fuji's front page today is absolutely gushing with schadenfreude. Claims it will destroy the presidency of Mrs. Park, who it detests.

Lots of speculation but no symapty.My heart goes out to those both on the boat and those waiting on shore.just hope a miracle happens because it is so sad

It is reported that the passengers heard a large thud like sound. The seas were not terribly rough and I doubt visibility was that bad where they could not see an approaching boat.... plus they probably had radar. Could they have hit a Submarine....

WordStar

A little early claim what the headlines are when Yukan Fuji is an evening news, don't you think? LoL

If the bang was heard after the tilt, it may have been cargo (cars?) shifting. It would have most probably made the effects of a leak worse.

If the passengers were inside, wearing a life jacket would make it harder to get out.

In any case, 12 degree water, hanging onto something that floats, is better than drowning.

Sounds like the crew were completely clueless.

Those poor kids...

From what I heard the depth around the area is about 45m making it very shallow and there could have been an underwater reef in which the ship could have hit.

From what I saw on TV, it seemed close to some rocks. May have drifted though, local currents are strong apparently.

SamuraiBlue@Thanks for the nice LOL, but the online version of Yukan Fuji is posted around 11:00 am. Go to this link, scroll down to the bottom and you can see it. http://www.zakzak.co.jp/

Several hundred high school students take off on a journey of fun and adventure. A few hours later, they are facing a cold death by drowning in pitch black rooms. I just can't imagine it. My imagination just siezes and stops. And of course if a N. Korea connection is discovered (struck by an N Korean spy sub, even if by accident), WWIII will start.

While not impossible, I doubt a North Korean sub was involved.

Sometimes humans need to follow their instincts. If water was coming into a boat and had tilted, wouldn't be just sitting down and waiting like these kids were told. Neither would I stay at work in a building next to one that had a plane crash into it. Safety procedures are all well and good, but sometimes you have to go with what you feel to do.

Terrible accident. I'm surprised the captain and most of the crew survived.

Good example of the illusion of safety. People need to learn to NOT listen to the authorities to 'sit still'! The authorities only want to prevent panic but they don't know the real threat, therefore many people die because they listened to the authorities who stick to their useless and routinely practiced safety guidelines.

North Korean sub...give me a break.. more like a lapse in judgement.

Very sad. It seems safety procedures were not up to snuff else there likely could have been an orderly evacuation.

If there weren't enough lifeboats, going into water that cold would be deadly fairly rapidly, unfortunately.

It's a tragedy any way we look at it.

I took a carnival cruise in 02 with my wife from Miami. The very first thing we did after checking in and before we left port was to don life jackets and report to evac stations. They told us the most important thing was to get to the deck as fast as possible.

Telling passengers inside a severely listing ship to stay put makes absolutely no sense and is likely to be a mitigating cause in the very high death toll.

From what I heard the depth around the area is about 45m making it very shallow and there could have been an underwater reef in which the ship could have hit.

That's still pretty deep at around 150 feet. These types of ships don't draw that much of a draft, maybe 30 feet at the most. Most of this type of ferry is above the water, so I doubt that they ran into something that caused the damage. These types of ferries have the tranist nailed down to the wire to meet a schedle. If they were on their normal course, then they should be aware of any navigational hazards.

Since this ferry was also designed to carry vehicles and containers, maybe some hazardous material might have exploded in the cargo area.

I am amazed more people didn't survive. Maybe they couldn't swim?

The water temperature in the area was about 12 degrees Celsius (54 Fahrenheit), cold enough to cause signs of hypothermia after about 1½ hours of exposure

If you scuba you'll find this statement wrong. At those temperatures even with a 5mm wetsuit you'll start shivering within 2~3 minutes and will not be able stand the cold after 15~20 minutes.

Without the suit I don't think you'll be able to stand it more then 5 minutes.

I am amazed more people didn't survive. Maybe they couldn't swim?

They were told to stay inside. By the time the water reached them it was probably too late/dark to make their way out on top of the panic.

Jees, seeing as the ship is virtually upside down and mostly underwater, I think people are going to have prepare themselves for the final death toll being in the hundreds.. What a tragedy

After being in COLD SEA water for such a long time, I really doubt we will find any survivors, but maybe only a miracle can help a few of these passengers, if by chance they are in some pocket of air,etc...but I would prepare myself for the very worst!

I heard they have plans to send some oxygen into the ship if possible. I hope many are still waiting to be rescued in that overturned ship.

Agree with Elbuda. They're dead. R.I.P

In Asia planes and ferries have accidents, in Southamerica earthquakes and fires.. what is happening?

I hope no Japanese are among the casualties.

RR

This is now a recovery operation.. no longer a rescue. There were heroes aboard. Ms Park Ji Young, a 22-year-old crew member of the ferry Sewol, lost her life while struggling to ensure that all passengers on the third and fourth floors were rescued. She refused to get on a raft while there were students aboard.

There is no need to speculate about explosions or submarine collisions. The loud bang could simply have been the sound of one of the big trucks in the car deck toppling over once the ship started listing. "RoRo" ferries are an inherently unsafe design, and they really should not be used for passenger traffic. There have been so many accidents with this sort of ship already.