Updated July 25, 2026 – 8:09 p.m.,first published 6:50 p.m. Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add more. TOTOTO Palu, Indonesia: Indonesian rescuers have found alive 11 European tourists and one local crew member who were missing after their speedboat apparently broke down and
Updated ,first published
Palu, Indonesia: Indonesian rescuers have found alive 11 European tourists and one local crew member who were missing after their speedboat apparently broke down and sank due to bad weather off a bay on the island of Sulawesi, officials said Saturday. Search teams continued to search for the ship’s captain.
The ship left a diving center in Tojo Unauna regency of Central Sulawesi province on Friday morning bound for Marisa port in neighboring Gorontalo province, but did not arrive as planned, said Heriyanto, head of the Search and Rescue Office of Gorontalo province.
A local tour guide reported the boat missing to the search and rescue office at 3:40 p.m. on Friday, prompting an immediate search operation, said Heriyanto, who, like many Indonesians, uses only one name.
“Concerns arose when their speedboat had not arrived in the afternoon,” Heriyanto said. “We immediately launched a search mission overnight, but so far we have found no sign” of the ship or the people on board.
According to Indonesian authorities, there were five Dutch citizens, three Germans, a Czech, a Belgian, a French woman and two Indonesian crew members on board.
There was no immediate comment from the embassies representing the missing tourists.
Heriyanto said dozens of search and rescue teams were deployed in a search operation that covered approximately 300 square nautical miles of waters along and around Tomini Bay, a renowned marine tourism destination, with dozens of islands dotting its vast waters, according to tour boat route projections.
Indonesia’s meteorological agency forecast generally clear skies in the area, but rescuers faced challenging sea conditions on Saturday, including strong winds and waves that reached up to 2.5 meters high.
As of Saturday afternoon, rescue teams in two speedboats searching the waters where the ship was believed to have disappeared finally located the 11 foreign tourists and one crew member alive. However, the boat’s 29-year-old captain remains missing, Heriyanto said.
“We will continue the search and rescue operation for up to seven days to find him,” he said, adding that the rescued passengers have been safely evacuated and are staying at a resort in Tojo Unauna.
Survivors told rescuers that the ship faced adverse weather conditions before the accident which caused their boat to break apart, leading the passengers to save themselves by reaching a life raft, while the captain became separated from the group in poor visibility due to thick fog.
“The captain is believed to have remained on board when the ship split into two sections and sank,” Heriyanto said.
Indonesia is an archipelago with more than 17,000 islands, where boats are a common means of transportation. Due to lax safety regulations and overcrowding problems, accidents occur frequently.
On July 15, a passenger ship carrying 76 people sank off Selayar Island, killing at least four people and leaving 14 others missing.
AP
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