37 from sunken ferry rescued

Thirty-seven passengers and crew of the ill-fated ferry M/L Piary were rescued by a Malaysian ship Monday from choppy waters between Palawan and Borneo island, the Navy said yesterday.

Among those rescued were Golden and Apang Civil, Jeffrey and Mads Mirod, Binare Sappay, Etom Badidile, Seilon Masirul, Johar Hassan, Sahad Abdulrahim, Nora Aldani, Samsudin Sarail, Norlea Muhamad, Sandra and Minin Asaral, Joey, Nasilin, and Alex Muhamad, Wowie Kulabi, Lambry Carim and Garcia Jaali.

Commodore Gerry Malabanan, Navy spokesman, said the Malaysian tanker Pacific Valor plucked the survivors from the Sulu Sea near the border with Malaysia, and that among them were two boys aged six and nine and a 10-year-old girl, who were later taken to Brooke’s Point in Palawan.

Around 40 other people remain missing, he added.

Meanwhile, Malabanan said a Navy plane taking part in search and rescue operations sighted five more survivors at about 11:40 p.m. Monday 17 nautical miles from Fearless Shoal.

"Our Navy Islander plane is currently flying over the five survivors floating in one group to serve as locator for our Navy rescue ship now rushing to the area," he said.

Malabanan said a Navy ship was headed for the spot where the reconnaissance plane saw the survivors, and was to pick them up by 7 last night.

Malabanan said they expect to find more survivors early this morning as the Navy widens the search and rescue operations.

Malaysian navy ships have also joined the search for the missing passengers and crew, he added.

Malabanan told dzRH radio the Navy ship BRP Carlos Albert met up with the Pacific Valor early yesterday morning to take the unidentified survivors.

He said the Navy was informed about the rescue around 10 p.m. Monday and immediately dispatched a vessel to rendezvous with the Pacific Valor, which was en route from China to Sandakan, Malaysia.

Seven of the Piary ’s 69 passengers were children, he added.

The Coast Guard station at Brooke’s Point said the ferry radioed its distress call around noon Sunday from some 100 kilometers away to say water was coming through a hole on its wooden hull.

The Navy said the ferry started sinking shortly after,

and that the passengers and crew prepared to abandon the ship and board a life raft.

The Coast Guard said the sea in the area is "very rough" at

this time of the year.

The 63-ton Piary, with 69 passengers and six crew aboard, sank Sunday midway to its destination at Brooke’s Point in Palawan after departing from Mapun in Cagayan de Tawi-Tawi, a cluster of islets in the Sulu Sea.

Meanwhile, 12 crew members from two fishing boats were rescued off the island of Polillo in Quezon while at least five crew members of three other fishing vessels in the area are still missing since Saturday, the civil defense office said.

One of the boats was later found adrift off the coast of nearby Perez island.

One of its six crew members was found dead on its deck, civil defense officials said.

Turbulent northeasterly winds brought heavy rain across much of the Visayas and Mindanao over the past week, unleashing a series of disasters as the country prepared to celebrate Christmas.

The Office of Civil Defense said the adverse weather left at least 303 people dead or missing.

Officials have given up hope of finding any more survivors from the floods and landslides.

The last major Christmas disaster in the Philippines occurred on Dec. 20, 1987 when the Doña Paz ferry collided with an oil tanker south of Manila, killing an estimated 3,000 people in the world’s worst peacetime maritime disaster.

Earlier this month, a ferry that had been reported missing in Mindanao was found drifting in waters off Indonesia’s East Kalimantan region. All 57 on board were safe.

The ferry accident was the latest pre-Christmas disaster to hit the country, as rescuers were digging up the dead from a series of landslides in other islands that were estimated to have claimed more than 200 lives.

Nearly a week of heavy rain unleashed landslides and floods on the islands of Leyte, Panaon and Bohol as well as the northeast section of Mindanao.

Defense Secretary Eduardo Ermita said Monday that Panaon residents had given up hope of recovering relatives and neighbors still believed buried in several landslides.

"The stench is overpowering several days later, and the families of the missing in San Francisco (town) have given permission to the government to cover the rubble instead, converting it into a mass grave," he told dzBB radio.

Aerial footage of the island shown on television showed areas of bare soil where slips had occurred amid green coconut groves, burying villages on the narrow coastline. — AFP, Roel Pareño, Jose Rodel Clapano, Jaime Laude, AP