Over 30 survivors found after Bali-bound ferry sinks, leaving four dead

Rescuers have found more than 30 people after a ferry sank en route to Indonesia's resort island of Bali. So far, four bodies have been recovered and at least 31 people have been rescued, many of them unconscious after drifting in choppy waters for hours, according to the National Search and Rescue Agency.

About half of the ferry's 65 people on board are still missing. The KMP Tunu Pratama Jaya sank almost half an hour after leaving East Java's Ketapang port just before midnight on Wednesday, the agency said in a statement. It was bound for Bali's Gilimanuk port — one of Indonesia's busiest — roughly 5 kilometres away as the crow flies.

Family members came to the departure port in panic, some weeping, as they sought reassurance about their loved ones and hoped they were among the survivors. Supardi, a survivor said he climbed on top the ferry to jump off but it sank too quickly. \"After being at sea I met two other people whom I eventually joined. Then another person joined, so there were four of us in total, each using a life jacket strung around the neck. \"Until this morning, one of us died while the other three survived,\" he said.

The ferry sinking was witnessed by the on-duty officer at the port before it was reported to the rescue team. \"The ferry could not be contacted via radio from the beginning. Then it could be contacted by other ships from the same company. \"But the ship was already in a tilting condition,\" said Nanang Sigit, head of Surabaya Search and Rescue agency, in a statement.

\"For today's search we are focusing on searching on the water, as the initial victims were found in the water between the location of the accident toward Gilimanuk port,\" Mr Sigit said. Nine boats, including two tugboats and two inflatable boats, as well as local fishermen and people onshore searched for people. The ferry had 53 passengers and 12 crew members on board, along with 22 vehicles, including 14 trucks, the agency said.

There has been no official statement on the nationalities of the passengers, but a manifest list broadcast by news channel MetroTV indicated there were no foreigners on board. But rescuers said they were still assessing if there were more people onboard than the ferry's manifest showed. It is common in Indonesia for the actual number of passengers on a boat to differ from the manifest.

The Australian government is receiving regular updates from the Consulate-General in Bali and is not aware of any Australians that were on board. A Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spokesperson said the Australian government expressed its sincere condolences to those impacted by the ferry accident in the Bali Strait.

President Prabowo Subianto, who was on a trip to Saudi Arabia, ordered an immediate emergency response, cabinet secretary Teddy Indra Wijaya said in a statement on Thursday, adding the cause of the accident was \"bad weather\". Ferry tragedies are common in Indonesia, an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands, where ferries are often used as transport and safety regulations can lapse.

According to the source: Australian Broadcasting Corporation.