MANAMA, Bahrain - A cruise boat carrying more than 130 people capsized Thursday night off the coast of Bahrain, and at least 48 people drowned, officials said. Sixty-three people were rescued, NBC News reported, citing officials at a news conference.
The official Bahrain News Agency said the boat was on an evening cruise that was to last several hours. It overturned less than a mile off the coast, it said.
Officials said most of the boat's passengers were employees of a Bahrain-based company and were of several nationalities, including Bahraini, Egyptian, South African and British.
Information Minister Mohammed Abul-Ghafar, interviewed on al-Arabiya television, said the passengers included 25 Britons, 20 Filipinos, 10 South Africans and 10 Egyptians.
"So far, the (rescue) operations continue. God willing, there will be more survivors rescued," Interior Minister Sheik Rashid bin Abdulla Al Khalifa said in a telephone interview aired on Bahraini television
Television footage showed the boat, al-Dana, capsized but not sunk, as earlier reports had said, with rescue workers walking on its brown hull.
Images showed emergency personnel taking bodies wrapped in white sheets off a small dinghy. Men carried the bodies away in blankets or on stretchers, while boats with flashing lights moved in and out of port.
The Bahrain agency said the island nation's coast guard boats arrived at the site of the capsized vessel and that rescue operations had begun. It quoted Interior Ministry spokesman Maj. Mohammed Ben Dayna as saying more than 60 people had been rescued and taken to hospital.
Survivors in shock
Television footage also showed survivors, appearing in shock and their hair still wet, squatting on the floor of a hospital. Many of them covered themselves with blankets. One male survivor was shown being treated for head cuts.
Survivors hugged each other. Some had blood streaming down their faces. Several wept uncontrollably as friends and relatives tried to calm them.
Some survivors needed assistance as they disembarked from a rescue boat that brought them to shore.
There was no indication of what caused the boat to capsize in what appeared to be perfect weather conditions in the area. The boat's owners, according to Bahrain television, said overloading could have caused it to capsize.
Coast guard chief Youssef al-Katem said there were 150 guests at a dinner party aboard the vessel. The guests, he said, ate dinner while the boat was still docked and that up to 20 of them disembarked before it sailed. He said an investigation into the accident was under way.
Terrorism ruled out
Terrorism was ruled out by a senior interior ministry official who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media.
"I rule it out 100 percent," said the official.
"It's too early to say what caused the accident," Ben Dayna said.
According to officials at the news conference, the boat, which was owned by a private company, flipped over. Help arrived on the scene within five minutes, they said.
A U.S. Navy spokesman in Bahrain said American helicopters and divers were headed to the site. "We're sending divers, small boats and a helicopter right now," Cmdr. Jeff Breslau told The Associated Press.
A pair of helicopters could be seen from the shore flying low over the site of the capsized boat. Rescue teams on small boats could also be seen using flashlights to help them search for survivors in the night.
The accident came about two months after an Egyptian ferry sank in the Red Sea, killing about 1,000 people. The vessel was en route from the Saudi port of Dubah to the Egyptian port of Safaga when it went down before dawn about 60 miles off the Egyptian coast.
Bahrain is an oil-exporting and refining archipelago of 688,000 off the coast of Saudi Arabia.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12083338/
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