Death Toll Rises in Brazilian Ferryboat Sinking; Dozens Missing

SAO PAULO, Brazil — Amazon region rescue workers found two more bodies yesterday around a remote jungle town near where a boat ferrying people from a religious festival sank. The discovery raised the death toll to 17, with dozens still missing.The Comandante Sales ferryboat had no passenger list and authorities do not know how many people were aboard. It may have been carrying more than 100, and as many as 30 could still be missing, Navy Lieutenant Lenilton Araujo said.Some survivors may have swum to shore, but bad communications in the remote area, about 50 miles from the jungle city of Manaus, may have prevented them from reporting their survival to authorities, Lieutenant Araujo said.A fire commander, Antonio Dias, said 60 passengers had survived. “Some swam to safety and others were picked up by small fishing boats,” he said.The passengers had been attending the “Festival of the Divine Holy Ghost,” a Roman Catholic celebration held about 50 days after Easter in some parts of Brazil, Lieutenant Araujo said.The ferryboat, which revelers had rented to travel to and from the festival, capsized in a pre-dawn rainstorm on one of the Amazon’s largest tributaries, the Solimoes River.Torrential rain may have been a factor in the accident, but authorities are also investigating whether too many passengers were crowed aboard the wooden, two-story vessel, Lieutenant Araujo said.The Navy issued a statement saying the boat had been ordered not to travel following an inspection in January because it lacked the proper paperwork and a qualified crew, the official Agencia Brasil news agency reported. Sunday’s voyage was the boat’s first since its relaunch, local media said.Boats often serve as buses in remote parts of Brazil, where there are few roads. But boat accidents have killed more than two dozen people since February, when a two-story wooden ferry carrying more than 100 people collided with a barge loaded with fuel tanks on the Amazon River, killing 16.In March, a similar boat carrying 12 tourists and a crew of 10 on a wetlands fishing trip sank in the Pantanal area in Mato Grosso state south of the Amazon, killing nine.

Death Toll Rises in Brazilian Ferryboat Sinking; Dozens Missing

Death Toll Rises in Brazilian Ferryboat Sinking; Dozens Missing

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