Eight days after it capsized, Bangladesh calls off search for sunken ferry

Dhaka: Bangladesh on Monday called off its search for an overloaded sunken ferry, eight days after it capsized in the Padma River leaving more than a hundred people dead or missing. “Considering the adverse situation including the bad weather we have decided to call off the operation taking into account of the situation including the bad weather. We could not identify the sunken launch yet,” Deputy Commissioner of Munshiganj, Saiful Hasan Badal said.  He said the sunken Pinak-6 was declared abandoned as the search vessels with their sonar detection systems could not locate the ferry despite frantic searches for the past one week. “We have tried our best to rescue the capsized launch (ferry) but the inclement weather, strong current and wave of the Padma forced us to take decision,” he added. However, the recovery of bodies in the river would continue and a salvage vessel would be kept standby near the accident site, he said. Meanwhile, desperate relatives continued to try to locate the sunken ferry themselves by hiring fishing trawlers, fearing that their loved ones might still be trapped inside. While the ferry, whose license had expired, had a capacity of 85 passengers, it was carrying some 230 people when it sank. Rescuers earlier retrieved 46 bodies and 28 of them only could be identified while over 100 passengers were rescued alive by vessels and speedboats within hours after the accident. The rests were listed as “missing”. Earlier, the Police said they launched a manhunt for the owner and captain of Pinak 6 as a case had been lodged accusing them of murder charges for overloading passengers, plying the ferry with an expired license and disregarding its instructions not to sail due to bad weather conditions. Ferry accidents are common in riverine Bangladesh -criss-crossed by some 230 rivers especially in the southern and northeastern regions - with faulty design of boats and poor safety standards generally blamed for the disasters. According to media reports, 5,500 people have died and 1500 gone missing in 658 ferry disasters since 1994. PTI