100 Killed As Ferries Sink in Bangladesh

About 100 people died yesterday when two ferries, one of them dangerously overloaded and the other reported to be hosting a bridal party, sank in Bangladesh rivers during a storm, witnesses said.

"I counted at least 51 bodies, but police on the scene are saying 55 bodies have been recovered," said a Reuters cameraman at Alipur, about 12 miles from Dhaka, where a double-deck ferry went down.

Rescuers had told him the ferry, sailing from Dhaka to southern coastal districts, had been carrying 400 people, double its official capacity.

Police said divers were searching the river for survivors but expected casualty figures to rise. Several passengers swam ashore or were rescued by passing boats.

Ahmed Mansur, a shopkeeper, said: "We heard people screaming for help from the river. We saw some trying to swim to the shore."

Another ferry sank in the same storm near Kishoreganj, about 90 miles north-east of Dhaka. A Bengali newspaper reported that 40 passengers were missing in that incident.

Winds of up to 40mph and rain lashed parts of Bangladesh on Monday, damaging houses and felling trees and electricity poles. Ferries are a popular, but accident-prone means of transport in the country. Nearly 90 people have died in two ferry accidents in the past two weeks.