The number of deaths by boat accident in Uganda rises to 33 – police

The toll of a boating accident on Lake Victoria over the weekend has risen to 33, said Ugandan police, while survivors described moments of high consumption of water. alcohol and noisy jokes in front of the ship, slammed and sunk in shock.

The Saturday night tragedy took place hundreds of meters from the shore as the boat carrying a hundred partygoers was carrying one beach to the other in the Mukono district, near the capital Kampala.

Police spokesman Patrick Onyango said the number of bodies found in the water was 33 on Monday while 27 people were saved alive. The death toll is expected to increase, he said.

This is the second fatal accident on Lake Victoria in as many months. In September, more than 200 people died when an overcrowded ferry sank to the Tanzanian side of the lake.

Divers from the police and the army continued their efforts to recover the bodies while equipment was deployed to try to pull the wreckage from the boat to the coast, said Onyango.

Cruises on Lake Victoria, shared by Uganda, Kenya and in Tanzania, are common, with most young party goers spending hours on the waters to party.

A survivor, Shamirah Nsereko, told NTV Uganda on Sunday night that the captain had repeatedly warned pbadengers that the boat was overturning and taking water.

"But then you talk to people so drunk," she said, adding that party-goers could not hear the captain's orders.

"Suddenly we saw one of the (musical) speakers fall off, that's when things went really bad."

On Sunday, President Yoweri Museveni blamed the accident for an overload, saying the boat was carrying more than its capacity of 50 people.

Read: Museveni says that a capsized cruise ship has been overloaded

The owner of the boat and his wife died in the accident, he said.

Another survivor, Edward Kateregga, also told NTV Uganda that the boat's engine had been damaged several times before the disaster. During the rush that followed the sinking of the boat, many people jumped on a boat that arrived a few minutes later to rescue the victims.

"I jumped on it and went back into the water after realizing that it was not going to get there." A minute had pbaded before the boat capsized as well. "said Kateregga.

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