DHAKA, Bangladesh, Feb. 22 (UPI) -- A double-decker river ferry carrying up to 140 passengers capsized after colliding with a cargo trawler on the Padma River in Bangladesh on Sunday, killing at least 70.
The ferry was lifted and towed ashore after divers finished searching for bodies.There were 19 children and 24 women among the dead.
"Our people are using boats to survey the river for any dead bodies," Rasheda Ferdousi, a local government administrator, said. "But here at the scene we are calling off the search as there are no more bodies inside the ferry."
About 40 to 50 people were rescued or swam ashore. Authorities returned 68 bodies to family members.
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Police arrested two crew members of the cargo trawler the ferry collided with.
Passengers on the lower level of the ferry may have been trapped as the ship sank. Many of the people who survived jumped out of the boat and into the river from the upper deck.
"The passengers who were on the deck survived, but many who were inside were trapped," Hafizur Rahman Sheikh told the Prothom Alo newspaper.
It is unclear how many passengers were traveling as ferries in Bangladesh usually don't carry formal passenger manifests.
"Usually the ferry operators don't keep any records and we came to know from survivors that there were more than 100 people on board," Rashida Ferdouse, deputy commissioner of the district of Manikganj, told CNN.
River systems in Bangladesh have multiple boat accidents each year due to overcrowding, poor monitoring and poor boat quality. There are more than 130 rivers in Bangladesh.
