hankyoreh

Details on the causes and events of the Sewol ferry sinking emerged on May 15 with an interim investigation announcement by prosecutors. Fifteen crewmembers were arrested and charged with failing to rescue passengers; four of them, including the captain, were charged with murder.

The behavior by crewmembers uncovered in the investigation was incredibly inhumane. When the ferry began to list after a veering sharply at about 8:52 am on Apr. 16, the captain and crew apparently already knew the boat was sinking. Yet they did nothing to rescue the passengers up until the time they were the very first rescued by the Coast Guard at 9:39 am. They ignored a vessel traffic control center message ordering them to prepare to evacuate passengers, along with a wireless message from crew members in the cabins requesting other messages besides “stand by inside the ship.” Each of them had rescue duties according to the ship’s operation regulations, yet they decided to gather in plain clothes in the wheelhouse and the third floor corridor before fleeing by themselves. They didn’t notify passengers of the emergency situation, nor did they assist two cooks who had been injured. Presumably, they thought this might delay their rescue, even though they knew that everyone would drown if they did nothing.

Never mind meeting their rescue responsibility - they appear to have thought only of their own survival, and if the passengers died, well, there was nothing they could do about that. Under the circumstances, charges of willful negligence would seem justified. The fact that prosecutors decided to charge four of them with murder - a first for a large-scale disaster like this - seems to be a response to the angry demands for punishment.

Still, the crewmembers aren’t the only ones who should be held accountable. According to the investigation findings, expansion work on the boat had left it with a severe left-right imbalance and reduced its ability to maintain stability, greatly limiting the amount of freight it could safely carry. Yet it appears that the company used less than half the necessary ballast water to keep the vessel stable, choosing instead to put that much more cargo on board. It did this for over a year, earning some 3 billion won (US$2.9 million) in extra profits. On the day of the accident, the Sewol had roughly double the permissable load. Also, the containers were apparently just piled up on deck and loosely secured, without any kind of restraining device. All the while, the company was blithely submitting formal safety inspection reports - even after two near-misses with tilting vessels. All of this suggests that passenger safety took a back seat to financial gains.

The company and the vessel’s owner may have thought that the risk of a disaster was an acceptable one; if so, they deserve worse punishment than the crew.

The Coast Guard also shares in the responsibility. We need to know if the reason they sat at the scene without attempting any rescue for over 40 minutes while the boat sank was their belief that nothing could be done for the trapped passengers. The prosecutors need to be even more rigorous as they continue the investigation.

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]