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An international salvage team was to arrive late Sunday in the
Philippines to remove toxic cargo from a sunken ferry so divers
could recover hundreds of bodies, an official said.
The plan is to bore a hole in the hull of the
sunken MV Princess of the Stars to remove containers containing 10
tons of endosulfan pesticide so that the recovery of bodies can
continue.
The 24,000-ton vessel is sitting upside down on
a reef off the central island of Sibuyan, with part of its hull
jutting from the waters.
Only 57 survivors have been found, along with
161 bodies, many of them having washed ashore to nearby islands. The
official death toll stood at 173 over the weekend. (See related
story A2.)
It is believed that most of the dead are trapped
inside the ferry.
The ferry carrying about 850 people onboard was
sunk by Typhoon Frank more than a week ago, but the already
slow-moving rescue operation was suspended Friday after it emerged
the vessel was carrying containers of pesticide.
Coast guard and navy divers, assisted by US navy
frogmen, were immediately pulled out the water amid growing fury
among relatives of the dead at the slow pace of the operation.
“We will commence cutting of the hull tomorrow
[Monday],” coast guard chief Wilfredo Tamayo told reporters.
“They will be here before dark” on Sunday,
he added without naming the salvage outfit hired from Singapore.
The removal of the containers should be
completed by Wednesday, after which the salvage company hired by the
ferry’s operators would study the removal of the fuel onboard, he
added.
It was not clear when the grim search for bodies
would continue.
Authorities had belatedly learned that the ferry
had been illegally carrying large volumes of the toxic pesticide
that might leak into the water.
Tamayo said Sulpicio Lines, the ferry operator,
and the authorities have studied but ruled out refloating the vessel
for the time being.
“That option has been considered earlier, but
it was deemed that the cutting of a hole in the vessel is more
appropriate at this time,” Tamayo said.
A maritime industry official said Saturday that
Sulpicio Lines would be unable to claim full damages from insurers
if the boat was refloated.
Sulpicio Lines has had at least three other
major accidents since 1987, when its Doña Paz vessel collided with
an oil tanker, killing around 4,000 people in the worst peacetime
maritime disaster in history.
The government has suspended the company’s
operations until further notice. A board of inquiry was also
conducting hearings on the company’s possible liability.
-- AFP
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