Cries of anguish as South Korea ferry toll tops 100

JINDO (South Korea) — For a moment, there is silence in the tent where bodies from the South Korean ferry disaster are taken for identification. Then the anguished cries begin.

The families who line up here to view the decomposing bodies covered in white sheets have not known for nearly a week whether they should grieve or not. Now that they know, they sound like they are being torn apart.

“Bring back my daughter!” cried one woman as she emerged from the tent crying and falling into a chair where relatives tried to comfort her.

The confirmed death toll from the April 16 disaster off South Korea’s southern coast reached 113 yesterday, officials said, and about 190 people are still missing.

Most of the victims are students from a high school in Ansan, near Seoul, who were on their way to the southern tourist island of Jeju. The number of corpses recovered has risen sharply since the weekend, when divers battling strong currents and low visibility were finally able to enter the submerged vessel.

Emergency task force spokesman Koh Myung-seok said bodies have mostly been found on the third and fourth floors of the ferry, where many passengers seemed to have gathered. Many students were housed in cabins on the fourth floor, near the stern of the ship, he said.

Twenty-two of the ferry’s 29 crew members survived and nine of them have been arrested or detained in connection with the investigation.

Captain Lee Joon-seok and two crew members were arrested on Saturday on suspicion of negligence and abandoning people in need.

Prosecutor Yang Jung-jin said a court issued arrest warrants yesterday for four other crew members the authorities had detained a day earlier. Two additional crew members were detained yesterday.

The four crew members arrested yesterday talked to reporters after a court hearing, their faces hidden with caps, hooded sweatshirts and masks. One said they tried to correct the ferry’s listing early on, but “various devices, such as the balance weight, did not work”. The crew member said they reported the distress situation and tried to launch the lifeboats, but the ferry was too tilted by then.

The cause of the disaster is not yet known, but the captain has said he waited to issue an evacuation order because the current was strong, the water was cold and passengers could have drifted away before help arrived.

A Ministry of Ocean and Fisheries official had said on Friday that the vessel had taken a sharp turn. It remains unclear why the ship turned around. The third mate, who was arrested on Saturday, was steering at the time of the accident in a challenging area where she had not steered before, and the captain said he was not on the bridge at the time.

In Ansan, funerals were held for more than 10 of the teens yesterday, and education officials were building a temporary memorial that they expected to complete today.

At the city education office, parents issued a letter pleading for more government help in the search and condemning its response so far. The letter also criticised the media for reporting false rumours, and for doggedly pursuing interviews with surviving children. “The children say that when they look at the window, a sudden fear of water seizes them. What the children need is utmost stability,” said Mr Jang Dong-won, father of a rescued female student. AP