Eleven Indonesian fishermen survived after three days at sea by clinging to a capsized boat, rescuers said Wednesday, as they looked for no less than 22 crew members still missing after a weekend incident that left two people dead.
Dewi Jaya 2, with no less than 35 crew, capsized in waters off the distant Selayar Islands in South Sulawesi province on Saturday before the 11 vessels were found, which had stranded on two separate atolls after days of floating within the sea.
According to a neighborhood search and rescue agency, their boat capsized attributable to bad weather during Indonesia’s rainy season.
“They floated within the sea for 3 days, the present carried them into Selayar waters,” local government official Andi Caco Amras said on Wednesday.
The fishing boat sailed from the port of North Jakarta to the island of Lombok in West Nusa Tenggara province on March 3.
Volunteers from the navy and rescue employees helped within the search.
“A joint team will perform a search and rescue operation and set out… this morning,” local search and rescue official Andi Raswan said.
He said it will take rescuers five hours to succeed in the scene.
The survivors were found after local fishermen spotted them and alerted authorities, state news agency Antara reported.
They were taken together with the boat to the Selayar Islands. The boat was capsized, the underside was up
Amras told Agence France-Presse that survivors endured three days at sea by donning life jackets and tying themselves to boats.
“They were taken together with the boat to the Selayar Islands. The boat was capsized, the underside was up,” the official said.
The 93 gross tonne vessel was carrying “fishing equipment corresponding to fish traps, nets, stones, ropes, coconut leaves and fishing rods,” he said.
Amras said there have been 35 people on the boat and 22 were missing, while the rescue agency gave a better variety of 37 and 24 missing.
In Indonesia, it’s common for the actual variety of passengers on a ship to differ from that stated within the manifest.
Authorities received reports of the incident early within the morning but said bad weather hampered their efforts.
Maritime accidents in Indonesia, an archipelago in Southeast Asia consisting of roughly 17,000 islands, are a standard occurrence attributable to lax safety standards.
In 2018, greater than 150 people drowned when a ferry sank in certainly one of the world’s deepest lakes in Sumatra.
Additional reporting by the Associated Press
