SEOUL: South Korean President Park Geun-hye on Sunday met relatives of passengers still missing after the sinking of a ferry last month, vowing that any culprits would be "sternly punished" as the confirmed death toll rose to 244. Eight more bodies were recovered on Sunday, 18 days after the 6,825-tonne Sewol capsized and sank with 476 people on board -- most of them schoolchildren -- while 58 remain unaccounted for. "Anyone responsible for the accident and criminally at fault will be sternly punished," Park said during a meeting with relatives camped on Jindo, the nearest island to the wreck where search operations are centred. "I feel a sense of unlimited responsibility... It is heart-rending to imagine how you are feeling," she said, according to a pool report. Television footage showed Park, who was visiting Jindo for the second time since the ferry sank on April 16, inspecting a tented village set up in the harbour to manage the process of identifying recovered bodies. The meeting comes days after she apologised for her government's failure to combat systemic and regulatory "evils" that may have contributed to the accident and her comments reiterated an earlier promise to hold those responsible accountable. The ferry sinking is one of South Korea's worst peacetime disasters, made all the more shocking by the loss of so many young lives. Of those on board, 325 were students from the same high school in Ansan city, just south of Seoul. Public anger has focused on the captain and 14 of his crew who abandoned the ship while hundreds were trapped inside. But criticism has also been directed at the government, as more evidence emerges of lax safety standards and possible corruption among state regulators. Some victims' families have rejected Park's apology. Dive teams have been struggling to gain access to blocked cabins of the submerged ferry, with the search hampered by fast currents and high waves. Divers have had to grope their way down guiding ropes to the sunken ship, struggling through narrow passageways and rooms littered with floating debris in silty water. As days go by, personal belongings and other items from the ship have been spotted further and further away, fuelling concerns that some victims of the ferry disaster may never be found. One body was retrieved Friday by a fishing vessel four kilometres (two miles) away from the recovery site, and another was found two kilometres away on Wednesday. As a precaution, recovery workers have put rings of netting around the site. Bedding materials from the ship were found as far as 30 kilometres from the disaster site on Friday. The Sewol's regular captain, who was off duty on the day of the accident, has told prosecutors that the ferry operator -- Chonghaejin Marine Co -- "brushed aside" repeated warnings that the 20-year-old ship had stability issues following a renovation in 2012. Two Chonghaejin officials were arrested last week and another on Sunday on charges of having the ferry overloaded well beyond its legal limit.

http://m.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20140505/NEWS/405050312&template=wapart
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/asiapacific/s-korea-leader-vows-to/1094448.html

Q: What do you think went wrong? A: The first chain of error, in my opinion, is the lax oversight. Adding those cabins is a significant alteration and would have called for submitting plans. On the first day everyone focused on the captain because he certainly didn't do the right thing. But there's the crew, the owner, expanded to the (Korean Register of Shipping). Too many people had to have been involved. Normally when you add that top weight the flagging classification society would have required an inclining experiment prior to issuing a new stability letter. Q: What was required to adjust for the extra top weight? A: When issued, the new safety certificate conditions were set, drastically reducing the amount of cargo the ship could carry and increasing the amount of ballast required. The ship was carrying three times the amount of cargo allowed. The paper looks good but the oversight looks rough. There are assumptions in the stability letter that the cargo is properly secured and that the rolling cargo be properly secured according to maritime industry standards. They inspected the sister ship — the exact same ship — and 75 percent of the securing equipment was inoperable. Q: What else stands out to you from what you've heard about the capsized ferry? A: The last financial audit for the company showed $521 spent on safety last year. That ship carried 46 or 47 inflatable life rafts. In the U.S. the cost of inspecting one 15-person life raft is $1,500 per life raft — times 46. Life rafts are required to be inspected annually. Two of 46 life rafts were deployed. The crew talked about being unable to deploy more. Q: Do you think this is indicative of a bigger problem with maritime safety in South Korea? A: I worked 10 years as a port captain on the East Coast and inspected a lot of ships with Korean crews. My opinion is they were well-trained and well-educated seafarers. It's not a cultural thing. I inspected at least 100, probably many more. In safety management there's a term called complacency. The further away from your last accident, the closer you are to your next accident. The more you get away with, the more you push the envelope. You didn't have cargo shift before; why waste time securing it? That was her regular run. The captain probably said, "I got away with being in my cabin last time. Maybe I can get some sleep this time." Q: What else did the captain and owners do wrong? A: The captain would have been required to be on the bridge. It doesn't mean the third mate would have been relieved. The narrow waterway, heavy traffic, lots of fishing boats, known inexperience of the third mate: all these conditions would have required the master's presence. Any one of them would have. The captain under "bridge resource management" should have been on the bridge. Two weeks (earlier) the ship reported in writing to the vessel owners an unexplained steering loss condition. Under the international safety management code, that's a required near miss. An immediate response from all levels of management is required. Q: What could have been done differently? A: It took all of these links to make this happen. I teach safety management at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. The accident that's prevented is the one that you managed. In emergencies any brain says, "I don't want to be here. Make this go away." Because you trained and drilled, the response kicks in: "I've trained. I've seen this." That's how you overcome that fight-or-flight reaction. Most important is the behavior of the senior personnel. The captain is in charge of communications. If he's sending false or inaccurate information, you're going to realize down the chain that the appropriate help hasn't been alerted yet. First thing that should have been done is, the alarm should have been rung. Passengers and all crew should have been mustered. Passengers should have been assembled at the safest location on the ship. Distress signals should have been sent immediately. An overstated, not understated assessment should have been given

*from different news reports

Whilst unfortunate that there had to be bodies at all, at least the families have a sense of closure... Kindly take a moment to mourn for the future they lost, and love the life that had.

Next time you make a news thread, please don't just paste news articles verbatim. Highlight the main points of a news event and post links to articles if you wish.

R.I.P All of those who passed away. Have a safe voyage home to our lord and savior.

R.I.P may they be one step closer to nirvana

>>6>>7 both of you shut up

>>8 No you.

go fight

Guys, It's no time to quarrel now.