At least 80 Dead after Migrant Boat Sinks off Sicily
Published 03 October, 2013, Associated Press
- FILE Photo of Similar Boat Taken on 30 Sept, 2013:
- A boat that carried a group of some 200 migrants lies on the shore in Sicily, Italy. (AP)
At least 80 people died when a ship carrying African migrants toward Italy caught fire and sank off the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, spilling hundreds of passengers into the sea, officials said Thursday.
Antonio Candela, the government's health commissioner for Palermo, is quoted by LaPresse news agency as saying that 80 bodies have been found and that search and rescue operations are continuing.
So far 159 people have been rescued, but the boat is believed to have been carrying as many as 500 people.
It is one of the deadliest migrant shipwrecks in recent times and the second one this week off Italy: On Monday, 13 men drowned while trying to reach southern Sicily when their ship ran aground just a few yards from shore at Scicli.
Lampedusa Mayor Giusi Nicolini said the dead today, Thursday, included a child of about 3 and a pregnant woman. "It's an immense tragedy," she said.
Coast Guard ships and helicopters from across the region, as well as local fishing boats, were on the scene trying to find survivors in the sea, said Coast Guard spokesman Marco Di Milla. The operation was taking place off the Isola dei Conigli, or Rabbit Island.
The migrants were from Eritrea, Ghana and Somalia, he said.
Nicolini said the ship had caught fire after those on board set off flares so it would be seen by passing ships.
Lampedusa is closer to Africa than the Italian mainland and is the frequent destination for smugglers' boats.
Bodies Start Arriving at Portside
Video Showing Similar Overloaded Unseaworthy Boat Full of Immigrants Trying to Reach Italy:
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