A total of 396 people were confirmed dead on Saturday after a cruise ship capsized in China, state media said, making it the country’s worst shipping disaster in nearly 70 years.
Only 14 people were confirmed alive out of the 456, mostly tourists aged over 60, on board when the “Eastern Star” rapidly sunk on the Yangtze River in a storm on Monday, France24 reported.
The death toll jumped by over 200 after rescuers hoisted the battered ship out of the Yangtze River on Friday and began recovering bodies trapped inside.
That would make it China’s worst shipping disaster since 1948, when up to 4,000 on board the SS Kiangya were killed when it sunk near Shanghai.
Online images showed workers from surgical suits handling body bags in the vessel’s dark cabins, while others slept on a nearby floating platform, exhausted by their grim work.
A total of 46 people remain missing, but a government spokesman said on Thursday that no new survivors are expected to be found.
Reports citing witnesses said the 76.5-meter long and 2,200-ton ship overturned in under a minute.
