Russia’s deadly marine disaster
President Dmitry Medvedev on Monday ordered sweeping inspections of Russia’s aging fleet of civilian ships after more than 100 people—including dozens of children—were feared dead when an allegedly overloaded Volga River cruise ship sank in a thunderstorm on Sunday, in the country’s worst marine accident in 25 years.
“It’s already clear that this disaster couldn’t have happened if safety regulations were followed and inspections were conducted,” Mr. Medvedev told a hastily called meeting of top officials. “The quantity of old tubs plying our waters is excessive.”
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin appeared to have tears welling in his eyes as he called for a moment of silence to commemorate the dead at a separate meeting with economists that was carried on state television. Tuesday was declared a national day of mourning.
Sunday’s disaster was the latest in a string of accidents that have highlighted the often dilapidated state of Russia’s transport infrastructure, much of which dates to the Soviet period. At Monday’s meeting with Mr. Medvedev, officials reported on a plane crash involving a Soviet-era Antonov-24 turboprop that crash-landed early Monday in a Siberian river, killing six. Mr. Medvedev called on officials to push for the phase-out of those old planes, as he had with similarly aged Tupolev-134 liners after a deadly crash last month.
Prosecutors said they found “numerous violations” by the operators of the Bulgaria, a two-deck, 78-meter vessel built in 1955 that was returning from the port of Bolgar to Kazan when it sank in a storm Sunday afternoon.
Lacking the appropriate license and rated for no more than 140 passengers, the ship was carrying 208, investigators said, including two dozen who weren’t on the manifest. The Bulgaria was listing four degrees to the right and its port-side engine wasn’t functioning when it left port, officials said. The ITAR-Tass news agency quoted the ship’s radio operator, who survived, as saying he and passengers had tried to talk the captain out of sailing in the bad weather.
About 2½ kilometers from shore in the broad Kuibyshev reservoir along the Volga, the ship hit a heavy thunderstorm with high waves, officials said. As the ship turned, it was swamped by a wave and tipped over, trapping most of the passengers, including nearly 50 children who were attending a musical performance. Few could reach lifeboats or vests.
“It didn’t take even five minutes. There was no announcement and it just sank,” survivor Nikolai Chernov told the official RIA-Novosti news agency. “It tipped over on the right side, turned over and went down,” said Mr. Chernov, who lost his wife and 5-year-old grandson in the wreck.
“The music in the cabins was playing until the very last moment, there was no SOS,” survivor Ruslan Zabirov, whose pregnant wife drowned, told the ITAR-Tass news agency.
Svetlana Imyakina, director of OOO Agrorechtur, which rented the ship for the voyage, said the Bulgaria was in good working order. “Its capacity was 156, but it could easily take 200 people,” she said in a brief telephone interview. “I’m at the prosecutors, I can’t talk at all.”
Interfax quoted an official of the ship’s owner as saying such vessels are designed to operate safely with only one functioning engine and that the slight rightward list was typical because of a heavy sewage tank on that side of the ship. He said the operator was properly licensed but that crew error might be a possible reason for the disaster.
State television showed a state inspector who said the Bulgaria had been checked and cleared for sailing a month ago. Similar vessels were stopped by officials for spot checks on Monday but allowed to continue their trips.
Struggling against strong winds and current, divers spent Monday bringing up the dead. About 80 people were reported rescued, many with cuts and bruises from having broken through portholes to escape. The death toll rose to more than 50 Monday and was expected to climb further as the remaining corpses were removed from the wreck, which lay in about 18 meters of water.
Officials said the accident was the worst in Russia since 1986, when a passenger ship struck a freighter and sank off Novorossiisk in the Black Sea, killing at least 423 people.
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