Death Goes To Sea: The Titantic, Lusitania, And More Epic Nautical Tradgedies by Richard Bolden

Author:Richard Bolden [Bolden, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2015-10-28T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 4:

MV Le Joola

The MV Le Joola sank during a time of peace, which makes it different from the previous chapter, but also one of the worst peacetime shipping disasters in the world. The number of deaths that occurred when the MV Le Joola sank was 1,863, approximately 300 more than the number of people who died in the Titanic incident. It is also one of the more recent ship disasters to take place since it sank in 2002.

The MV Le Joola was not a pleasure cruiser and it was not a military ship, instead it was a Senegalese ferry. The ship began operating in 1990, sailing twice a week with passengers going from Senegal to Dakar. Passengers would take the ferry to Dakar to sell items at the large market. The MV Le Joola was only 259 feet in length with 39 feet in width. Its gross tonnage was 2,100. The ship was rated for 580 passengers. So why on the date of September 26, 2002 was the ship carrying close to 2,000 passengers?

The Passengers

Only 1,034 of the passengers on board Le Joola had tickets. Some of the passengers did not require tickets because they were children under the age of five. Others simply did not buy tickets, as was common, according to research notes.

The Stormy Night

The Le Joola was just off the Gambia coast when it entered a storm. High winds and extremely rough seas caused the ferry to capsize, which investigation records indicate only taking five minutes to do so.

Passengers and cargo flew into the sea. Most people were killed instantly due to the weight of the ship coming down on them. Those who managed to survive the overturning of the ship drowned anyway. Just 64 of the passengers on board are alive today. Local fisherman rushed to the rescue, saving any person who was alive and bringing some of the bodies on board. It took several hours for the government to send in rescue teams, which arrived the morning of September 27th. Despite the ship being overturned in the water, it remained topside, the hull exposed, until shortly after 3pm. Passengers were trapped inside as the ship continued to sink to the bottom.

A dive team, lead by Haidar El Ali, dived the wreck area on September 28, 2002 just two days after it capsized. They were able to pull out 300 bodies trapped inside, and another 100 were also recovered from around the ship. The dive team did not see any survivors as the ship continued to sink. Only 551 bodies were recovered, with a startling low number of 93 identified. The unidentified were placed in cemeteries located in Kabadiou, Mbao, and Kantene along the Gambian coast.

Why the Disaster Happened

Most investigators of the MV Le Joola incident cite the nearly 2,000 passengers as the main cause for the ship to capsize in the storm. It is reasonable since the number of people on board was three times over the limit. It is known that most of

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