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SOUTH KOREA SAID today that two people were killed and more than 100 missing after a ferry capsized at sea with 477 people on board – mostly high school students bound for a holiday island.
“So far, 368 have been rescued,” Lee Gyeong-Og, the vice minister of security and public administration, told a press briefing in Seoul.
Officials voiced concern over the fate of the 107 people unaccounted for, fearing that many may have been trapped as the vessel listed sharply and capsized within two hours of sending a distress signal at 9am (12am GMT).
Terrified
Dramatic television aerial footage showed terrified passengers wearing life jackets clambering into inflatable boats as water lapped over the rails of the vessel as it sank.
Some could be seen sliding down the steeply inclined side of the ferry and into the water, as rescuers, including the crew of what appeared to be a small fishing boat, struggled to pull them to safety.
Of the 448 passengers on board the ferry which had been bound for the popular southern resort island of Jeju, 324 were students travelling with 14 teachers from a high school in Ansan, just south of Seoul.
Lee’s ministry said two people had been confirmed dead, including one male student and one female crew member.
Many appeared to have been rescued by fishing and other commercial vessels who were first on the scene before a flotilla of coastguard and navy ships arrived, backed by helicopters.
Lee said divers, including a team of South Korean navy SEALS, were continuing to search the submerged vessel.
“There is so much mud in the sea water and the visibility is very low,” he added.
The 6,825-tonne ferry, which had sailed out of the western port of Incheon on Tuesday evening, ran into trouble some 20 kilometres off the southern island of Byungpoong.
‘A really loud noise’
The cause of the accident was not immediately clear, although rescued passengers reported the ferry coming to a sudden, shuddering halt – indicating it may have run aground.
The weather conditions were described as “fine” with moderate winds and sea swell.
“There was a really loud noise and then the boat immediately began to shift to one side,” said one rescued adult passenger, Kim Song-Muk.
People were scrambling to get to the upper decks, but it was difficult with the deck slanted over.
Photos broadcast on television showed the ship initially tilted by more than 45 degrees on the port side with helicopters flying overhead, and then fully capsized with only a small section of the stern showing above the water.
One local official who had taken a boat to the site and arrived an hour after the distress signal was sent, said he was “very concerned” about those still missing.
“The ship was already almost totally submerged when I got there. A lot of people must have been trapped,” the official, who declined to be identified, told AFP by phone.
The water temperature was cold at around 12.6 degrees Celsius (55 Fahrenheit).
There were 29 crew members manning the vessel, which was also carrying 150 cars.
‘We jumped into the water’
“I heard a big thumping sound and the boat suddenly started to tilt,” one rescued student told YTN by telephone.
Some of my friends fell over hard and started bleeding. We jumped into the water and got picked up by the rescue boats.
Distraught parents of the students gathered at the high school in Ansan, desperate for news.
There were chaotic scenes in the school’s auditorium, with parents yelling at school officials and frantically trying to make phone calls to their children.
Scores of ferries ply the waters between the South Korean mainland and its multiple offshore islands every day, and accidents are relatively rare.
However in one of the worst incidents, nearly 300 people died when a ferry capsized off the western coast in October 1993.
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If someone nailed that to my door I’d remove it as well sharpish and possibly have whoever put it up done for vandalism as well.
I think it was a useful reminder of stuff we don’t usually think about, it should have stayed
That’s the owner of that door to decide Stephen
I suppose, but I think he/she should have appreciated the socio-historical value of the plaque being placed there and let it remain
As long as it wasn’t your door
The “socio-historical value” of a man who died because he refused help?
It’s far too easy, that ‘he refused help’ explanation, lets us all off the hook
If it was put on my door I’d remove it . Pronto .
Shouldn’t have been put up in the first place.
Exactly. If it was my property no I’d not want it being used to make a political point.
Where where these people before he died
The media really did the dog on that sad story as well all the while ignoring the reality that some people don’t want to be helped.
Or some people are getting the wrong help might be more to the point perhaps .
In a way… But his family put him up on numerous occasions, even clubbed together to get him a permanent residence if memory serves. The fact that he still died on the street shows, to my mind’s eye, that John Corrie didn’t want to be helped. People fall through the cracks in life and it’s sad, but it’s also reality.
Reading this report and the comments, I think some like me are a little confused with some key info missing on this one.
Was the plaque initially put there with the permission of the owner? Who put up the sign initially, and in what capacity? Is it a private property a private residence or a business premises? Did the journal attempt to get a comment from the property owner? Or indeed ask them directly if they had removed it? It has apparently been missing for approx 6 weeks, did anyone notice in the meantime?
Any or all of these would add welcome context.
Sorry, removed 2 months ago, which is therefore only 1 month after he died (no information if it went up immediately after his death).
I’ll be honest, I’m a little surprised by the missing detail in an article that involved 3 reporters.
Politicising a personal tragedy of someone who refused an available bed the night he died is simply crass.
Those who use homelessness as a political weapon don’t understand homelessness.
Where was Rose before he died?
Little Ms Labour should concern herself with other problems
Don’t worry about her she is very much yesterday’s news …she has as much chance of getting elected as the cars trying to go to work the other morning onto our wonderful new infrastructure which wasn’t gritted – Her former colleague in Labour blamed Irish Water and their taking of the Car Tax monies -
Why did the county Managers not highlight this travesty – silence from the lot of them – as quiet as a whistleblower in H.S.B.C !
A lot of senators are putting their heads up from the trough these days , there must be an election coming up .
Maybe it was taken down because it is not written in intelligible English. Not one sentence, colon instead of a preposition. “Away” runs into R.I.P., “of” missing.
“Labour Senator Lorraine Higgins, who has been working with Hope4Homeless on some of its initiatives, said whoever took down the plaque has “insulted the memory of Jonathan”……….. as she submitted her €3,000 expenses for February for the 3 days she was in the Seanad.
Lorraine Higgins is a shameless ….
It’s the same with these memorials people insist on putting by the side of the road when there’s been a car crash. It’s really no appropriate to put up a permanent thing like that.
This has always bugged me. I dont understand it….
I suppose its just to mark where the person died
Marking it by distracting other drivers?
Totally agree. These things shouldn’t be allowed.
What use is a f*cking plack to a man thats dead
Yes, a plack (small copper coin) is no use to a dead man.
It had a good innings. No way was Molesworth St going to let that stay for long. It gets in the way of the positivity vibe
I don’t get the “44 steps away” aspect here; yes, he died 44 steps from Leinster House but it isn’t as though they’d have given him soup and a bed if he had made it 44 steps further down the road….
I guess it’s just not the ‘in-thing’ to be homeless like it was for a whole week in late 2014. People and the media move on to other stories and rightly so. This week we re all talking about a solicitor being kicked out of his mansion. Help the Killiney One!!!
Why should he stay in his beautiful mansion when he owes 71 million ?? If you want to life the high life , you got to pay for it !
That didn’t last long, back to normal so. Cant have a reminder of our homeless directly in our faces now can we. Out of sight out of mind.
Regardless if shouldn’t be there or not. IRS disrespectful and should have been put to the family. Perhaps the plaque should have been put on the fence. Still rude to remove without informing the family. Have a bit of empathy.
You can’t go around attaching signs to private property wherever you see fit.
Blaming whomever removed it for ‘disrespect’ is missing the point – whomever put it up is the only person at fault here.
My dad dropped dead right outside the local newsagent’s when I was thirteen. Should I have stuck something to their door in his memory?
Did he die sleeping out side homeless Neal?
Through his own choice
Typical Irish government response to those in need….
Do you think the govt removed the plaque? Are you really that stupid?
Yes she really is.
F Off Higgins
What about all the other people that day that passed away. Why don’t they get a plague. Or do you have to be homeless and a junkie to get sympathy from the bleeding hearts. Please! If people want a plague buy a headstone for the guy. Otherwise this is just ridiculous.
I’m pretty sure you mean plaque and not plague – no one wants to “get a plague”.
This article states a cause of death as hypothermia. Has a cause of death been legally established? Has there or will there be a coroner’s inquest?
Someone has to say the unsayable here.
No one forced Jonathan Corrie into that doorway. He walked there all by himself.
Jonathan Corrie died because he thought he could be the first person in history with a manageable heroin habit.
He sold two houses for heroin. He ended up homeless because he sold two houses that he had been given. He had been given houses. He didn’t end up homeless because he had nowhere to go. He ended up homeless because he chose to sell the place he had to go. Twice.
He abandoned his children for heroin. For two years, his children travelled up to Dublin looking for him – can you imagine what that did to them? Whatever else he did, for doing this to his children, he deserved to die.
And so he died. Alone in a doorway, just him and his cravings.
No loss.
All these people complaining weren’t much good to him now . Family included
Houses like that should not be allowed sit idle – makes city look crap, could be used to house people etc…… who owns it anyway?
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