Mysteries at Sea

While investigators are about the unveil a report into the deadly accident on Lake George in upstate New York involving the boat Ethan Allan, which capsized killing 12 senior citizens, reports from Egypt bring word that a major catastrophe has occurred in the Red Sea.

A boat carrying at least 1,300 people appears to have sunk.

Egyptian officials told news service reporters that 12 survivors have been rescued so far, and that 14 bodies had been recovered.

Early reports said that rescue teams on helicopters sent to the scene saw survivors in boats and clinging to debris as well as bodies floating in the water.

There was no distress call, and no immediate indication of what caused the ferry, the 6,650-ton al-Salam Boccaccio 98, to go down.

An official from the ferry's owner, al-Salam Maritime Transport, told Reuters that weather had been very poor overnight on the Saudi side of the Red Sea, with heavy winds and rain. But visibility should have been good out at sea, he added.

The ferry was on a trip between the Saudi port of Duba and Safaga, both at the northern end of the Red Sea. It had originally come from Jeddah, the main port for the pilgrimage to Mecca.

Another company spokesman told the BBC that the ferry was carrying 1,310 passengers, 96 crew members and about 40 vehicles.

He said that most of the passengers were Egyptians returning from work in Saudi Arabia, but that there were also pilgrims returning from Mecca, and about 100 Saudi and Somali citizens.

There's no word as to the cause although there was bad weather in the vicinity of the incident. Survivors continue to be found as are bodies:

The head of the Egyptian Maritime Authority is telling the Associated Press that both survivors and bodies from the missing Salaam 98 cruise ship have been found. A police source tells Reuters that "dozens of bodies were picked up from the sea," but AP's current report does not go that far. AFP is reporting numbers similar to AP, and CNN at the moment sources matching figures to Egyptian state television.

Various reports have also mentioned the possibility of bad Red Sea weather at the time of the ship's disappearance. In an interview on CNN, the Egyptian transportation minister said the weather was poor and "the sea was very high."

This report is more specific about where the ship is believed to have gone down.

As for the Ethan Allen investigation, the Warren County prosecutors will decline to file charges against the boat's operator or owner. However, investigators have focused on an engine pump that may have contributed to the instability of the boat. The Ethan Allen capsized on October 2, and a ceremony was held earlier this week honoring rescuers who first responded to the accident scene.

UPDATE:
Israel had offered search and rescue assistance to the Egyptians, but Egypt declined the offer. A British Navy ship is also headed towards the disaster location. You really have to wonder what would prompt Egypt to decline assistance at a time of need such as this. Yet we see it happen time and time again. Jews assisting Muslim doesn't sit well with the Arab/Muslim governments around the world, and undermines the whole Jews=Evil pablum they feed through their state-controlled medias on a daily basis.

UPDATE:
The Ethan Allen report has been released. No culpable criminal conduct. The Albany Times Union has a comprehensive roundup.

UPDATE:
While Egyptian authorities say that nearly 300 people survived, they're realizing that it's quite possible that more than a 1,000 people were killed when the boat sank.

A spokesman for President Hosni Mubarak said the ferry did not have enough lifeboats, and questions were raised about the safety of the 35-year-old, refitted ship that was weighed down with 220 cars as well as the passengers.

"It's a roll-on, roll-off ferry, and there is big question mark over the stability of this kind of ship," said David Osler of the London shipping paper Lloyds List. "It would only take a bit of water to get on board this ship and it would be all over. ... The percentage of this type of ferry involved in this type of disaster is huge."

Weather may also have been a factor. There were high winds and a sandstorm overnight on Saudi Arabia's west coast.

The more we hear about this tragedy, the more it sounds like someone wasn't doing a good job making sure that these boats were safe. Not having enough lifeboats? Didn't anyone learn the mistakes of the Titanic? RoRo ships capsizing because of design defects or instability problems? These aren't new problems and instability is a problem that keeps killing people on boats of all sizes.