00:00At least 15 people are confirmed dead, and more than 25 remain missing after a passenger ferry
00:12capsized off the coast of Basilan province in the southern Philippines. The vessel,
00:18M.V. Trisha Kirstin III, was carrying 332 passengers and 27 crew members when it went
00:25down shortly after midnight on Monday. The ferry had departed from Zamboanga City and was en route
00:31to Holo in Sulu province when disaster struck. Admiral Rani Gavan, chief of the Philippine Coast
00:38Guard, confirmed that the vessel was not overloaded at the time of the incident.
00:43The search and rescue operation is ongoing, but what I can say is the ship is not overloaded. It
00:49has a maximum passenger capacity of 350, and the actual passengers on board as declared by the
00:59master is 332. The Coast Guard has immediately acted on it as soon as it received or we received
01:06the distress call from the sea marshal on board. Basilan Governor Mujiv Hataman shared on Facebook
01:13clips from the scene at Isabella Port in Mindanao, which showed survivors being ushered off boats,
01:19some wrapped in thermal blankets, and others being carried on stretchers. According to initial
01:25reports, the ship's crew sent a distress call around 1 a.m. local time, reporting serious technical
01:31problems. Amid strong waves, the vessel eventually capsized and sank. Search and rescue operations are
01:38ongoing, with Coast Guard teams working against time to locate the missing passengers. An investigation
01:44has been launched to determine the exact cause of this tragedy.
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