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Collision sent ferry to the bottom of the sea
Canada has relayed its sympathies to victims of last week’s collision between the passenger vessel MV Saint Thomas Aquinas 1 and the cargo ship MV Sulpicio Express 7 in Cebu waters.
In a statement, Canadian Ambassador to the Philippines Christopher Thornley also commended the emergency services workers and rescuers who are searching for the missing.
“On behalf of the Embassy of Canada, I would like to express our deep concern and condolences to the families of the victims of the M.V. Thomas Aquinas marine accident. Our thoughts go out to all of those affected by the ferry accident, and we would like to convey our support and appreciation to the emergency services workers and rescuers searching for the missing and injured,” he said.
The Canadian Embassy in the Philippines said it is standing by for developments surrounding Philippines latest maritime tragedy.
In a post on its Twitter account, the embassy said it is ready to provide consular assistance to any Canadian citizen affected by the incident.
Canadian nationals may contact the embassy’s 24-hour Emergency Watch and Response Center in Ottawa toll-free at 1-800-1-110-0226 (landline only) or 1-613-996-8885 or by e-mail at [email protected], it said.
They may also call the Embassy at (02) 857-9000, remain on the line and the call will be transferred to Ottawa.
At least 31 people were confirmed dead from last Friday night’s incident.
A report on state-run Philippines News Agency quoted Transportation Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya as saying their initial findings showed there were foreigners on board the St. Thomas Aquinas, but added they were all safe.
However, he said a New Zealand national is confined in a hospital in Cebu.
Earlier, the United Kingdom said it is ready to offer assistance to British nationals who may have been among the victims.
“We are aware of the shipping accident off the port of Cebu. We are in touch with local authorities. We stand ready to offer Consular assistance to any British nationals that may have been involved in this incident,” UK embassy Chargé d’Affaires Stephen Lysaght said.
As the investigation continues into the final moments in the latest fatal shipping disaster to strike the Philippines, where over-crowded or overloaded vessels are common and sea regulations are notoriously hard to enforce, a vexing but familiar question faces a country plagued by an abysmal record in maritime safety: what went wrong?
The MV St. Thomas of Aquinas, an inter-island ferry loaded with 870 passengers and crew, had been at sea for about nine hours after leaving Nasipit in Mindanao, when it approached Cebu.
The yellow-hulled MV Sulpicio Express Siete, laden with containers, had just left Cebu’s port with 36 crew.
As they both entered a narrow channel about 550 meters wide in the dark at about 9 p.m., they appeared to have strayed onto the same lane from opposite sides, officials said, according to media in the Philippines.
Under navigational rules, both vessels must steer to the right if they are on a collision course, Commodore William Melad, head of the coast guard district in the central Visayas region, told Reuters.
The ferry repeatedly blew its horn and sent warning signals, said 2GO Group Inc., which owns the ferry. “They blew their horns several times before the collision,” Bimsy Mapa, spokesman for 2GO Group, told Reuters.
Another 2GO Group official, speaking on condition of anonymity because a formal inquiry into the accident is pending, said the ferry could not veer right because the water was too shallow on that side.
“Our options were to turn right or left, but we couldn’t turn right because we would hit shallow waters so we veered left,” the 2GO Group official said.
Officials at Philippine Span Asia Carrier Corp., which owns the cargo ship, declined to respond to requests for comment. The vessel remains in Cebu, a gaping hole in its bow.
“We need to review whether both ships followed regulations,” said Melad, the Cebu coast guard chief. “If they are approaching each other, there should be a safe distance. Otherwise, you signify intention to move to the right and the other should move to the right also, so that there won’t be any collision.”
Melad said the vessels’ speed would also be checked for possible violation.
Tug boats typically accompany ships arriving and departing within one kilometers from the port, but the accident happened four kilometers out at sea, said Greg Castillo, a Cebu City councilor.
Authorities have suspended passenger and cargo shipping operations of both companies.
The cargo vessel’s owners were formerly known as Sulpicio Lines Inc., which owned the MV Dona Paz ferry that collided with a tanker in the Sibuyan Sea in December 1987, killing 4,375 on the ferry and 11 of the tanker’s 13-man crew. That ranks as the world’s worst peacetime maritime disaster.
The St. Thomas of Aquinas sank within minutes of the collision, but 750 people were rescued, mostly by fishing boats.
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