World

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Workers check on a salvaged boat which sank previous night after colliding with a ferry near Lamma Island, off the southwestern coast of Hong Kong Island Tuesday, Oct. 2, 2012. The boat packed with revelers on a long holiday weekend sank, killing nearly 40 people and injuring dozens, authorities said. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

Hong Kong police on Tuesday arrested six crew members from two boats in a collision that killed 38 holiday revelers, but offered no theory about how the vessels ran into each other on a clear night in one of the safest and most regulated waterways in Asia.

The Monday night crash was Hong Kong's deadliest accident in more than 15 years, and the worst maritime accident in more than 40. Some relatives of the dead went to the scene off Hong Kong island's southwest coast to toss spirit money in honour of the victims Tuesday, while other people waited at the morgue for tragic news about loved ones.

Police Commissioner Tsang Wai-hung said crew members from both boats were detained on suspicion of endangering passengers by operating the craft unsafely. "We expect further persons to be arrested," he said.

Tsang said police suspect both crews had not "exercised the care required of them by law," but he did not elaborate.

A ferry collided with the Lamma IV, which was taking more than 100 employees of Power Assets Holdings Ltd. and their families to famed Victoria Harbor to watch a fireworks display in celebration of China's National Day and mid-autumn festival.

The government said in a statement that 101 people were sent to hospitals; over 60 were discharged, and four had serious injuries or were in critical condition.

The ferry was damaged but completed its journey, and some of its passengers were treated for injuries. Local TV later showed images of the ferry, with its bow chewed up and chunks missing.

Hong Kong and Kowloon (Ferry) Holdings Ltd., the ferry operator, did not return calls seeking comment.

The government said 28 bodies were recovered overnight, and eight more victims were declared dead at hospitals. Two bodies found aboard the vessel Tuesday raised the death toll to 38, according to government statements. At least four of those killed were children.

Salvage crews raised the half-submerged Lamma IV using three crane barges that surrounded it Tuesday.

At the same time, several dozen relatives of victims travelled by boat to take part in a traditional Chinese mourning ritual, praying alongside Taoist priests and tossing spirit money into the wind.

Such large-scale accidents are rare for Hong Kong, a semiautonomous enclave off mainland China that has one of Asia's most advanced infrastructures and economies with first-rate public services. The accident is the deadliest to strike the territory since a 1996 high-rise fire that killed 41, and the deadliest ferry accident since 88 people died during a typhoon in 1971.