Senegal Ferry Disaster Town Remembers 20 Years After 1,900 Drowned

Twenty years after Le Joola ferry sank, the Senegalese town where half of the nearly 1,900 dead lived paid tribute on Monday to those killed in the disaster described as a "wound that never heals".

Ziguinchor, Senegal, Sept 26 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Sep, 2022 ) :Twenty years after Le Joola ferry sank, the Senegalese town where half of the nearly 1,900 dead lived paid tribute on Monday to those killed in the disaster described as a "wound that never heals".

When news spread that the vessel had capsized on the night of September 26, 2002, no one in the southern town could believe it.

"It was unthinkable," said Nouha Cisse, who was head teacher at a secondary school in Ziguinchor that lost 150 pupils to the tragedy.

A hundred relatives and officials took part on Monday morning in two religious commemorative ceremonies -- Catholic and Muslim -- next to around 50 graves in Kantene cemetery on the outskirts of Ziguinchor.

An official delegation laid wreaths, before women in long traditional dresses and their families visited the graves.

"It's very important for us to be here, to pay tribute to our mother and our nephew who we lost," said Ndeye Astou Diba, 38.

Le Joola was one of the worst civilian maritime disasters in history.

A total of 1,863 people drowned or were lost -- surpassing the Titanic toll of more than 1,500 some 90 years earlier.

Le Joola sailed into a storm off the coast of The Gambia on the way from Ziguinchor to the capital Dakar.