JAKARTA, Dec 20 (Reuters) – Hopes pale on Sunday for 78 individuals lacking from a ferry that sank off Indonesia’s japanese island of Sulawesi, officers stated, after 37 passengers had been pulled alive from tough seas by rescuers in helicopters, fishing vessels and rubber dinghies.

Three individuals have been discovered useless within the Gulf of Bone off South Sulawesi for the reason that vessel with 118 on board bumped into bother on Saturday.

Roki Asikin, head of the native rescue crew, informed Metro TV the seek for survivors would resume with daylight on Monday.

“We’ve tried our best with all the equipment we have, with the help of the search and rescue team’s helicopters and its Pacitan ship. We are grateful for fishermen’s help,” Alamsyah, chief of the Disaster Mitigation Agency within the island’s Wajo regency informed Reuters.

“But we are worried that more than 24 hours have passed. We are waiting for miracles, God’s miracles. We hope that all of them can survive.”

He stated waves of as much as three metres in top and powerful winds had hampered efforts to seek out survivors throughout the day.

Many of these rescued had been discovered with life jackets floating within the sea after that they had deserted the stricken ferry, and 4 individuals had been discovered alive in a fish lure.

One passenger rescued by fishermen, who gave his identify as Mussakar, informed the TV One channel: “When the ship listed and was about to sink, everyone jumped. There was a lifeboat … but then it capsized and sank.” (Reporting by Agustinus Beo Da Costa and Gayatri Suroyo; Writing by John Chalmers; Editing by Gareth Jones)

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