Symbolic imageLake Kariba ferry death toll rises to at least 44
Zimbabwe's police raised the death toll from Tuesday's ferry capsizing on Lake Kariba to at least 44 on Wednesday. Dozens remain unaccounted for as rough weather slows the search.
The police posted the new figures on X on Wednesday, 12 August, twice within 32 minutes: first 38 dead, then 44. The vessel, run by the state Rural Infrastructure Development Agency between the town of Kariba and islands and fishing villages, overturned in heavy waves on Tuesday, 11 August. Le Monde reported that President Emmerson Mnangagwa declared a state of disaster. The civil protection unit said 77 survivors were taken to Long Island and a dive team was airlifted in, while bad weather kept smaller boats away.
Overloaded from the start
The civil protection unit said the boat carried 114 adult passengers, five crew and an unspecified number of children against a capacity of 90, going by ticket sales. A crew member told the broadcaster ZBC that 153 were on board; a passenger said it began taking on water about 30 minutes after leaving Kariba.
A lake with a record of capsizings
The Guardian counts repeated accidents on the lake: 26 drowned on the Zambian side in 2014, 24 of them children, five in 2021 and three feared dead in October 2023.
Other opinions
The Hindu still carried the earlier count of 15 dead and 27 missing. Only The Guardian placed the lake in its colonial history: dammed in the 1950s, it displaced about 57,000 people.