South Korean ferry capsized 2 dead and 290 people missing

tragic. prayers for the affected

 

Extremely sad. Where did "noble" captains go who would leave their ship LAST??

 

I heard on the news that the captain might not have been at the helm when the accident.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/18/world/asia/south-korea-ship-sinking/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

[rquoter]The cause of the accident still isn't known. But a South Korean prosecutor said the captain, Lee Joon Suk, wasn't in the steering room when the Sewol started to sink; a third mate was at the helm.[/rquoter]

In other tragic news the vice principal for the high school that these students were from has killed himself.

[rquoter]Compounding that tragedy, one of those rescued, a high school vice principal who was on board the ferry along with more than 300 students, was found hanging from a tree, police said.

Kang Min Kyu, 52, vice principal of Ansan Danwon High School, was among the first survivors to be rescued.

Police said he apparently hanged himself with a belt from a tree near a gymnasium in Jindo, where distraught relatives of missing passengers have been camping out[/rquoter]

 

Doesn't it seem kind of logical that they would tell the passengers not to move while trying to right the ship? I mean...if the weight of all passengers suddenly start shifting significantly to one side or the other...then wouldn't it only exacerbate the problem? Not saying that was the right call but I could see why they would tell everyone to stay put. If everyone abandons the boat at the same time...then the ship may have capsized and sunk sooner. But, it's a really quick life and death decision that needs to be made. Either abandon ship asap in the hopes that doesn't exacerbate the problem with more people able to get off OR tell everyone to stay put while they try to right/save the ship. More people might have lived if they abandoned asap or maybe the ship capsizes quicker and they don't? Who could say for sure? You would really have to thought this one through in advance to make all the right calls and, without actually going through it, whose to say what call is the right call? Maybe if all the passengers shifted to the opposite side...the boated would have righted itself? The main issues to me is why did the boat list in the first place (they must have hit something I guess unless there was a significant weight imbalance on board) and then why did it eventually capsize some 30 minutes later.

 

If they all come to the upper deck, it doesn't mean they are all on one side. But at least they are not trapped. So no, it is not logical. In a situation like this, you always want to be on the upper deck.

Obviously not.

No, doesn't make any sense.

People don't weigh much, relative to the weight of a huge ship like this. The ship had a tonnage of almost 7,000 tons. 429 people at an average weight of maybe 60 kilos weigh maybe 25 tons, all of them together.

It's obvious, maybe not to you, but to everyone else.

It's not that hard. When a ship is about to sink, you want to get to the top of it, not be trapped somewhere down in the bottom. Doesn't take a rocket scientist.

 

alright...well thanks for being a d*ck about it mr. know-it-all. and, i don't think you are as sure as yourself as you come across.

 

It's not my fault that you have been posting nonsense on this thread, starting with talking about South Korea as a third world country (what?), and now that last post. What do you expect? Should I say "you might be on to something"?

"It's logical to tell people to stay in their cabins while a ship may be sinking"? Really? WTF?

I have been on all kinds of ships (modern cruise ships like the Explorer of the Seas, ancient Croatian ferries (just recently), big sail boats, etc.), and on cruise ships, they do these exercises for emergencies. You have to come to the upper deck(s) and congregate at the life boats when there is a situation like that, it's a drill they do at the beginning of, e.g., Royal Caribbean cruises. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muster_drill http://seniortravel.about.com/od/cruises/a/What-To-Expect-At-The-Lifeboat-Drill.htm

Anyway, it's a tragedy and it must be so horrible for the relatives. I think they would tell you something else if you told them "isn't it logical to say they should stay in their cabins?".

 

I didn't mean to imply South Korea was a third world country. I was trying to explain why, in general, I would prefer not to board some of those ferries because they are not properly regulated and safe. I also said that probably didn't apply to this SK ship.

If everyone is on one side of the ship that it is listing to, then it might make the ship capsize faster if it goes over the thresh hold. I thought most of these people were in entertainment area. Obviously, I would not want to stay in my cabin, either.

I wanted a conversation...not a d*ck-style lecture. But, I get you. You didn't like my posts...so you decided to be a prick about it.

 

Apologies, didn't mean to be rude. I usually like your posts. These just seemed weird to me.

 

That's okay. I accept your apology and I apologize right back to you. I just didn't get why your tone was so harsh to me when I have my own reasoning and thoughts to work through things like this as any person does. I don't think it's weird to try an understand why they would give an order for the passengers to stay put. Why would the captain do that if the answer is so obvious? It implies almost a criminal intent or at least a complete ignorance as to how to handle the situation. That was the reason for my post about ship weight balance. And, yes, I don't want to ride no third-world ferries if I don't have to, either (not saying this was one...just in general). lol

 

I am probably too used to posting in the D&D . Sorry again.

I think it's the latter, which is shameful. Maybe, and now I am speculating, there is also an element of Asian culture in there. "Restore order"...save face somehow...everyone just act as if nothing had happened. It's really awful that the guy left the ship as one of the first people, after he (and/or whoever else was in charge?) had told people to stay put. It's like that Schettino guy on the Costa Concordia.

As I said, I was on a really old Croatian ferry a few months ago (not third world, but the ship was just really old). It does feel a bit weird.

 

Well, they've issued arrest warrants for the captain and two crew members so that makes it criminal. I'm not sure what the charges are, though.

A situation like this makes you appreciate the captain of the Titanic all the more. In life and death situations like this, a captain is still going to save his own life regardless of who gets left behind. But, the Titanic captain didn't and died a hero. We have a better understanding and appreciation of that heroism when we see how some captains are in more modern times when tragedies occur.

 

I think we all need to keep some perspective here that we don't know all the facts, and might never know. This situation happened very fast and it seems like the captain and crew made some bad decisions but without knowing what situation was exactly, what type of information they were getting we don't know what really happened and why they made the decisions that they did.

This is like the MH370 situation where people were saying it was terrorism or that the flight crew was suicidal or in on some plot to hijack the plane. Those are possible but at the same time there are other explanations that also show that the crew may have been trying to save the plane in an unexpected and catastrophic event.

 

Just last night they had a panel being interviewed on CNN with Richard Quest and company where several of them were positive that someone intentionally flew the plane to the exact spot where it went down and was in control with nothing wrong with the plane whatsoever. Then, Richard Quest was on the opposite side saying we don't have the data to support that and you can't say for sure someone was at the controls of that airplane. It was a CNN standoff.

It's unfortunate that we now have two stories that CNN will spend all its time reporting on without knowing anything with panels of experts speculating all day long...as if one wasn't enough!

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/18/us-korea-ship-idUSBREA3F01Y20140418

Someone translated the vice principal's suicide note:
http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/c...ncipal_of_south_korea_school_in_ferry/cgvqapu

 

From the same link/article above:

Hmm.

 

A sharp turn by an inexperienced officer may have caused the ship to list.

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/so...korea-ferrys-turn-cause-deadly-sinking-n84136

Did South Korea Ferry's Turn Cause Deadly Sinking?

The investigation into the South Korea ship disaster focused Friday on a sharp turn the vessel made, as one expert warned that a design weakness common to car ferries likely contributed to the sudden sinking.

The Sewol made the sharp turn in the 10 minutes prior to its first distress call, but it's not known whether the maneuver was planned or caused by some external factor, said Nam Jae-heon, a spokesman for the Republic of Korea’s Maritime Ministry.

The turn could have sent unsecured cargo tumbling, causing the ship to list more than five degrees away from vertical — the critical point beyond which it is difficult to recover.

Water rushing into the vessel may then have sealed its fate, according to Carl Ross, a British marine architect and professor of engineering. He said the wide, open-plan vehicle decks of most car ferries could explain why the Sewol sank before hundreds could escape.

“If water gets into the vehicle deck, it can slosh from one side to the other, making the ship almost impossible to control,” he said. “You have to get off straight away or you’ve got no chance. The water will continue to come in and you’ll just get trapped.”

Ross said the sinking of the Sewol echoed a 1987 disaster in which the roll-on, roll-off car ferry Herald of Free Enterprise sank within minutes after taking on water as it set sail across the English Channel from Belgium to Britain.

“It happened so fast there wasn’t even time to raise the alarm,” said Ross of the 1987 sinking, in which 193 people died. “There was no time for an evacuation.”

Prosecutor Park Jae-eok said investigators were looking at whether the Sewol’s third mate ordered a turn that was so sharp that it caused the ship to list. The 26-year-old third mate, who had one year's experience steering ships and five months on the doomed vessel, was at the helm at the time it began to list sharply.

Yang Jung-jin, a senior prosecutor, said the 69-year-old captain Lee Joon-seok, was not present on the bridge as required when the ship was passing through an area with many islands clustered closely together.

Moon Serng-bae, professor of maritime-information engineering at Korea Maritime and Ocean University in Busan, told the Wall Street Journal that navigating through the area where the ship sank isn't straightforward and often requires vessels to travel in zigzag to avoid fishing boats or buoys.

Lee rushed to the helm and tried to re-balance the ship for up to 30 minutes before giving the order to evacuate, according to accounts from witnesses including one surviving crew member.

Prosecutors and police said Friday they have asked a court to issue arrest warrants for Lee and two other crew members. Officials were investigating witness claims that Lee was among the first to escape as the vessel sank under the surface, and whether the delay in evacuation led to the deaths of many on board.

Only 179 of the 475 passengers have been rescued since Wednesday’s sinking, with 28 confirmed dead. That leaves 268 missing, feared drowned, inside the submerged Sewol.

The ship had left the northwestern port of Incheon on Tuesday on an overnight journey to the holiday island of Jeju in the south.

The 6,835-ton ship had a capacity of 921 passengers, 180 vehicles and 152 regular cargo containers. Officials have not said how many containers or vehicles were on board, but local reports put the total cargo weight at between 600 and 1,200 tons.

A transcript of distress calls between the ferry and marine traffic officials suggests cargo on board may have shifted.

“What’s the current situation?” asked an unidentified official based in Jeju.

“Currently the body of the ship has listed to the left,” a Sewol crew member replied. “The containers have listed as well.”

Ross said tumbling cargo might have punctured the skin of the Sewol, sending water crashing in and making it impossible for the crew to order an evacuation.

“It’s a design failure on most car ferries — even modern ones,” he said. “The vehicle deck is open plan which means there’s nothing that can be done once enough water gets on board.”

A design modification — in which water would drain through a perforated deck into a zone divided by vertical bulkheads — would prevent water rushing across the width of the vessel, he said. However, the cost made the idea unpopular with operators.

He said reports that the captain told passengers to stay in place before eventually issuing evacuation orders likely contributed to the scale of the tragedy.

“These were mostly children who were listening to the instructions of adults,” Ross said. “They were just doing what they were told.”

NBC News' Arata Yamamoto in Jindo, South Korea, and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

 

From CNN:

 

That's freaking sad.

 

So we can't drive, ride or fly.

All kidding aside, this is the most horrific accident since the Malaysian plane went down, or so they say.