Deadly shipwreck

last updated 8 January 2015

Dakar, Senegal

Nearly 1,000 people, including scores of children, drowned off the coast of Senegal last week when a dangerously overloaded ocean ferry capsized in a storm. Fishermen and rescue teams could save only 64 people. “When I dove in, I saw bodies everywhere,” rescue worker Haidar el Ali said. “We saw bodies floating by the hundreds, the hundreds, the hundreds.” Designed to carry around 600 passengers and crew, the state-run ferry had far too many people aboard and was already listing to one side as it left southern Senegal bound for Dakar. Still more passengers caught up with the ship in canoes and climbed aboard as it headed out to sea. President Abdoulaye Wade vowed to prosecute those responsible for overbooking the ferry.