South Korean Ship disaster that shocked the world

South Korean President Park Geun-hye speaks during a meeting with parents whose children are now missing in Ship Sewol at a gymnasium in Jindo, South Korea, Thursday

The captain of the South Korean ferry which capsized on Wednesday has been arrested after he was pictured abandoning ship in a disaster which has left at least 29 passengers dead and hundreds missing.

Lee Joon-seok, 68, was in charge of the ferry, which was carrying 475 passengers when it turned sharply and later sank. There have been 28 confirmed deaths in the wake of the disaster, while some 273 remain missing.

However, as a damning new photograph shows, Lee was among the first to leave the ship. He can be seen dangling from a rope as he is helped onto a rescue boat while the ferry is still above water.

Prosecutors confirmed they had asked a South Korean court for his arrest, along with that of two other crew members. He was later pictured being restrained outside a court in Mokpo, south of Seoul.

It has since been claimed that he was not actually steering the ship during the disaster, having left the job to his third-in-command.

According to Korean prosecutor Park Jae-Eok, there is a chance that Lee wasn't in control of the vessel at that point.

He told Sky News: “He may have been off the bridge... and the person at the helm at the time was the third officer... The captain was not in command when the accident took place.”

Coast guard officials say divers have begun pumping air into a submerged South Korean ship 48 hours after it listed and sank. But it wasn't immediately clear if the air was for survivors or for a salvage operation. There were fears that it may be too late. Officials say 29 have confirmed dead as of Friday.

Boy pulled out from boat

Jo Yo-sep, an eight-year-old boy from a different family, was also pulled from the boat and separated from his family.

The young boy was trying to find his family as the ship was sinking but was picked up by 55-year-old passenger Kim Byung-kyu, who found the child after he fell on the floor when the boat fell on its side.

Meanwhile, the vice-principal of the high school whose pupils died has committed suicide by hanging himself outside a large gym where families of the victims were staying.

Police said that Kang Min-gyu, 52, had been missing since Thursday and appeared to have hung himself with his belt from a tree outside the gym.

Around 340 students and teachers in ferry tragedy

Out of 475 passengers and crew on the ship, about 340 were students and teachers from the Danwon High School in Ansan, an industrial town near Seoul, who were on an outing to the resort island of Jeju. They account for about 250 of those missing.

On Thursday, rescue teams made up of navy divers and the coast guard were diving into the waters where the ferry sunk, searching for those still missing.

The incident happened about 12 miles off the country's south western coast and also on Thursday, a man reported to be the ferry's captain, declared on Korean TV that he was ‘sorry and deeply ashamed.’

Yonhap news agency and Broadcaster YTN identified the man, who appeared with his face covered with a grey hooded top, as the captain.

Captain regrets error

‘I am really sorry and deeply ashamed,’ he said after being questioned at the Mokpo Coast Guard Office. In the brief videotaped appearance, he added: ‘I don't know what to say.’

“I gave instructions regarding the route, then I briefly went to the bedroom and then (the sinking) happened” he said. “The current was very strong, the temperature of the ocean water was cold, and I thought that if people left the ferry without proper judgement, if they were not wearing a life jacket, and even if they were, they would drift away and face many other difficulties.” the captain of the ship said.

He added that rescue boats had not arrived at the time of capsizing.

President condoles President Mahinda Rajapaksa has sent a message of condolence to South Korean President Park Geun-hye on the passenger ferry accident that took place off the southern resort island of Jeju on Wednesday. In his message, President Rajapaksa, while conveying the heartfelt and profound condolences of the Government and the people of Sri Lanka to his South Korean counterpart, has expressed confidence that with the characteristic courage and fortitude of the Korean people, they will be able to overcome their sorrow. Vice Principal hangs himself Vice principal The vice principal who had responsibility for hundreds of school children who died or went missing in a tragic South Korean ferry accident was found hanged in front of victims’ families. Kang Min-gyu, 52, was found hanging from a tree outside of a gym in Jindo, South Korea, near to where relatives of the victims are staying in the wake of the passenger ship sinking on Wednesday. The ferry was carrying 475 passengers when it capsized on a short journey between Icheon and Jeju on Wednesday. Around 28 people have been confirmed dead, while some 270 are yet to be accounted for. Kang taught at the Danwon High School in Ansan, near Seoul. Around 340 of the ferry passengers were students or teachers from his school, and make up the vast majority of those still missing. Police said he went missing yesterday before being found. Rescued girl The new claims come the day after the human scale of the tragedy was made clear by the story of a six-year-old girl who was rescued - but is still waiting for news of her parents and brother, who are among the missing. After being rescued, the distraught girl was taken to hospital in Mokpo, near the coastal city of Jindo, where she was treated. Despite ongoing rescue efforts, on Thursday the South Korean coast guard did not confirm if the young girl's parents and brother were dead or alive. The young girl and her family were travelling to the Island to look for a new home, a local newspaper reported. Survivor Yu Ho-sil helped rescue Kwon and said: ‘Somebody shouted at me from the back to take the baby and other students passed the baby outside.’ Once rescued, Kwon was able to tell authorities the names of her family members, but was unable to recall her address. After being rescued, the distraught girl was taken to hospital in Mokpo, near the coastal city of Jindo, where she was treated. Despite ongoing rescue efforts, on Thursday the South Korean coast guard did not confirm if the young girl's parents and brother were dead or alive. The young girl and her family were travelling to the Island to look for a new home, Korea Joongang Daily reported. Survivor Yu Ho-sil helped rescue Kwon and said: ‘Somebody shouted at me from the back to take the baby and other students passed the baby outside.’ Once rescued, Kwon was able to tell authorities the names of her family members, but was unable to recall her address. It has been reported that Kwon told medical staff her mother and brother gave her a life jacket before passing her up to the rescue boats. The hospital worked with authorities and rescue teams to find Kwon's other relatives by using her photo online. After a web post of her image went viral, the young girl's aunt and grandmother identified her and made their way to the hospital. After a medical assessed, it was determined that Kwon was in shock as a result of the accident and the unfamiliar environment. Despite being treated in a separate room to help calm her, hospital director Ryu Jae-kwang said Kwon had not suffered any severe external injuries. ‘To help stabilise her condition, we are limiting her contact with other people,’ he said.

Captain Lee Joon-seok, 69, now faces a criminal investigation for his part in the tragedy. Most the people on board were made up of students and teachers from a South Korean school.

Fresh questions have been asked about whether quicker action by the captain of the doomed ferry could have saved lives.

On Friday, rescuers continued the search to find the hundreds of passengers still missing and feared dead.

Officials also offered a rare look at their investigations, saying they were looking into whether a crewman's order to abruptly turn the ship contributed to the 6,852-ton Sewol ferry tilting severely to the side and filling with water Wednesday.

Death toll rises

The confirmed death toll from Wednesday's sinking off southern South Korea was 28, the coast guard said. Most of bodies have been found floating in the ocean because divers have been continually prevented from getting inside the ship by strong currents and bad weather.

But 48 hours after the sinking the number of deaths was expected to rise sharply with about 270 people missing, many of them high school students on a class trip. Officials said there were 179 survivors.

New questions were raised by a transcript of a ship-to-shore exchange and interviews by The Associated Press that showed the captain delayed evacuation for half an hour after a South Korean transportation official ordered preparations to abandon ship.

The order at 9 am by an unidentified official at the Jeju Vessel Traffic Services Center to put on lifejackets and prepare for evacuation came just five minutes after a Wednesday morning distress call by the Sewol ferry.

A crewmember on the ferry, which was bound for Jeju island, replied that ‘it's hard for people to move.’

The ship made a sharp turn between 8.48am and 8.49am Korea time, but it's not known whether the turn was made voluntarily or because of some external factor, Nam Jae-heon, a director for public relations at the Maritime Ministry, said on Friday.

The captain has not spoken publicly about his decision making, and officials are not talking much about their investigation, which includes continued talks with the captain and crew. But the new details about communication between the bridge and transportation officials follow a revelation by a crewmember in an interview with The Associated Press that the captain's eventual evacuation order came at least half an hour after the 9am distress signal.

Adverse weather hinders rescue efforts

Meanwhile, strong currents and rain made rescue attempts difficult again as they entered a third day. Divers worked in shifts to try to get into the sunken vessel, where most of the missing passengers are thought to

be, said coast guard spokesman Kim Jae-in.Coast guard officials said divers began pumping air into the ship

Friday, but it wasn't immediately clear if the air was for survivors or for a salvage operation. Officials said in a statement that divers were still trying to enter the ship.

South Korean officials also offered a glimpse into their investigation of what may have led to the sinking.

They said the accident happened at a point where the ferry from Incheon to Jeju had to make a turn. Prosecutor Park Jae-eok said in a briefing that investigators were looking at whether the third mate ordered a turn whose degree was so sharp that it caused the ship to list.

The captain was not on the bridge at the time, Park said, adding that officials were looking at other possible causes, too. Park also said crews’ testimonies differed about where the captain was when the ship started listing. As that listing continued, the captain was ‘near’ the bridge, Park said, but he couldn't say whether the captain was inside or right outside the bridge.

The operator of the ferry added more cabin rooms to three floors after its purchase the ship, which was built in Japan in 1994, an official at the private Korean Register of Shipping told the AP on Friday.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the person was not allowed to discuss matters under investigation, said the extension work between October 2012 and February 2013 increased the Sewol's weight by 187 tons and added enough room for 117 more people. The Sewol had a capacity of 921 when it sank.As is common in South Korea, the ship's owner, Chonghaejin Marine Co. Ltd, paid for a safety check by the Korean Register of Shipping, the official said, which found that the Sewol passed all safety tests, including whether the ship could stabilize in the event of tilting to the right or to the left after adding more weight.

Ian Winkle, a British naval architect and ferry expert said many ships have such modifications, to increase capacity, for instance.

‘In this particular case, it would have affected the stability by a small amount, but as it seems from the structure of the vessel, generally, it looks as if it was adequate to meet statutory regulations,’ Winkle said.

Bewilded relatives pray for safe return of relativesNear the site of the ferry, angry and bewildered relatives gathered on a nearby island watched the rescue attempts. Some held a Buddhist prayer ritual, crying and praying for their relatives’ safe return.

‘I want to jump into the water with them,’ said Park Geum-san, 59, the great-aunt of another missing student, Park Ye-ji. ‘My loved one is under the water and it's raining.

Anger is not enough.’Kim, the coast guard spokesman, said two vessels with cranes arrived and would help with the rescue and to salvage the ferry, which sank not far from the southern city of Mokpo. But salvage operations hadn't started yet because of the rescue attempts.

Out of 29 crewmembers, 20 people, including the captain, Lee Joon-seok, 68, survived, the coast guard said. Kim Soo-hyun, a senior coast guard official, said officials were investigating whether the captain got on one of the first rescue boats.The 146-meter (480-foot) Sewol had left Incheon on the northwestern coast of South Korea on Tuesday for the overnight journey to the southern resort island of Jeju. There were 475 people aboard, including 325 students from Danwon High School in Ansan, which is near Seoul, It was three hours from its destination Wednesday morning when it began to list for an unknown reason.

Oh Yong-seok, a helmsman on the ferry with 10 years of shipping experience, said that when the crew gathered on the bridge and sent a distress call, the ship was already listing more than 5 degrees, the critical angle at which a vessel can be brought back to even keel.

The first instructions from the captain were for passengers to put on life jackets and stay where they were, Oh said. A third mate reported that the ship could not be righted, and the captain ordered another attempt, which also failed, Oh said.

A crew member then tried to reach a lifeboat but fell because the vessel was tilting, prompting the first mate to suggest to the captain that he order an evacuation, Oh said.About 30 minutes after passengers were told to stay in place, the captain finally gave the order to evacuate, Oh said, adding that he wasn't sure in the confusion and chaos on the bridge if the order was relayed to the passengers. Several survivors said that they never heard any evacuation order.By then, it was impossible for crew members to move to passengers’ rooms to help them because the ship was tilted at an impossibly acute angle, he said.The delay in evacuation also likely prevented lifeboats from being deployed. ‘We couldn't even move one step.

The slope was too big,’ said Oh, who escaped with about a dozen others, including the captain.The last major ferry disaster in South Korea was in 1993, when 292 people were killed.

– Courtesy: Daily Mail, UK