Bangladesh Hit by Twin Ferry Disaster

Reuters reports the following:

Two river ferries capsized or sank in Bangladesh's storm-hit south Sunday and 240 passengers were reported missing as divers began a desperate search for survivors.

One of the packed ferries carrying around 250 people overturned early Sunday on the Meghna river and 50 were rescued, the state news agency BSS said. Earlier reports had said up to 300 were aboard.

A second ferry sank on the same river just one km (half a mile) away and 40 passengers were missing, police said. Six were rescued from that vessel.

The disasters were the latest in a long series in the history of impoverished Bangladesh.

"I could hear people screaming and chanting 'Allah save us' before I jumped into the water and managed to swim to a nearby char (river island)," one survivor from the Lighting Sun was quoted as saying by a reporter at the scene.

Survivor Yasmin Begum, 35, swooned repeatedly as she wailed over the body of her 18-month old son. Her husband and his sister were missing, witnesses said.

Ten-year-old Mohammad Rana looked helplessly for his missing grandparents. "Someone bring them back to me," said the boy, crying inconsolably.

About 400 people were killed and hundreds are unaccounted for after a triple-decker ferry sank in a storm, also in Chandpur district, in July last year.

Officials and police said many ferries often took people in excess of approved capacity, making it impossible to know the exact casualties after accidents.

Inland water transport authority officials say about 1,000 people die in ferry accidents in the country every year, but the number of missing is far more.

Bangladesh is struggling to clean up one of the world's deadliest ferry industries before the June annual rainy season.

The government has banned night sailing by small ferries and issued warnings to owners of larger vessels not to take on excess cargo and passengers. Listening to weather bulletins is now mandatory for sailors.

BBC Reports:

Many of the passengers were asleep when the accident happened and were feared to be trapped inside the vessel, Mohammad Dulal Miah, a police officer at the scene, told AP news agency.

"Even though the ferry sank close to shore, the river is turbulent here and it is hampering the rescue work," Mr Miah said.

Villagers and fishermen using motor boats are trying to rescue survivors, according to local reports.

Bad record

Ferry accidents are common in Bangladesh, which is crisscrossed by rivers and has few roads.

It is also the pre-monsoon season, when fierce storms can blow up quickly.

The stretch of the Meghna river where this latest accident occurred is notorious, says the BBC's Roland Buerk in Dhaka.

It is close to the point where it meets another great river, the Padma, causing strong currents, he says.

Information on last year's similar tragedy: Bangladesh: Preventing the Launch Tragedies