Series of tragic errors doomed Egypt ferry
(AP)
Updated: 2006-02-05 06:24

Shaaban el-Qott, 55, from Qena, Egypt, was looking for his cousin. He had been waiting at the port since Friday morning and spent the night on the street.

"No one is telling us anything. All I want to know if he's dead or alive. We rely on God. May God destroy Hosni Mubarak!" el-Qott shouted to a reporter Saturday, referring to the Egyptian president. "This government was supposed to throw this ship away and get a new one."

An injured survivor of the ship sinking in the Red Sea is carried off by paramedics from the Elanora cargo ship which had ferried the survivors to the port of Hurghada in Egypt Saturday, Feb. 4, 2006. [AP]

The rescue effort got off to a slow start. Initial offers of help were rejected, and two days after the ship set sail from Dubah, Saudi Arabia, just 376 survivors had been found. The ship's captain was reported missing.

Egyptian officials initially rejected a British offer to divert a warship to the scene and a U.S. offer to send a P3-Orion maritime naval patrol aircraft. Egypt reversed itself, but in the end only the Orion — which can search underwater from the air — was sent.

Four Egyptian rescue ships reached the scene Friday afternoon, about 10 hours after the ferry was believed to have capsized.

Many survivors complained that crew members discouraged them from putting on life jackets and said they did nothing to put lifeboats in service when it became obvious the ship would sink.

"It was like watching the movie Titanic," said Sayed Abdul Hakim, a 32-year-old painter who worked in Kuwait. "None of the crew brought down life boats or even told us how to use them. I swam for three hours. Then I spotted a rubber boat and I climbed in. I stayed there for 18 hours. I felt I was a dead man."

The tragedy struck a deep core of discontent among Egyptians, who are suffering from a considerable economic downturn and increased unemployment.

"Had the government made any job opportunities available at home, these people wouldn't have been forced to go abroad in the first place," said Moustafa Zayed, 24, whose father worked as a contractor in Saudi Arabia and was on the ship. "Had he stayed (in Egypt) we wouldn't have had money to buy food."

Tens of thousands of Egyptians work in Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf countries — many of them from impoverished families in southern Egypt who spend years abroad to earn money. They often travel by ship to and from Saudi Arabia.

Some on board the ferry were believed to be Muslim pilgrims who had overstayed their visas after last month's hajj pilgrimage to work in the kingdom.

Mubarak flew to Hurghada, about 40 miles farther north, on Saturday and visited survivors in two hospitals. Television pictures of the visit, which normally would have carried sound of Mubarak's conversations, were silent.

During the visit, Mubarak ordered that the families of each victim be paid $5,200 in compensation and the survivors $2,600 each.