26 people are missing after a ferry boat ran out of fuel and sank in bad weather off the coast of Indonesia, officials announced.
The search and rescue agency of the country said the vessel was carrying a total of 43 people when it capsized on Thursday, May 26, in the Makassar Strait, the sea separating the Sulawesi and Borneo islands.
News of the accident only reached officials on Saturday, May 28, said the local head of search & rescue, Djunaidi.
He revealed that 17 people had been rescued alive by 2 tugboats that had been passing by. Djunaidi added they had deployed a rescue team to search for the missing others.
A group of 40 rescuers was at sea searching for survivors.
Marine accidents are quite common in Indonesia, a south-east Asian archipelago of ~17,000 islands where safety standards are lax.
Last week, a ferry carrying 800+ people ran aground in shallow waters off East Nusa Tenggara province and remained stuck for 2 days before being dislodged.