SHIP SINKINGS KILLED 5590 PINOYS SINCE 1987

The sinking of the ferry MV Baleno-9 near Batangas Cty which killed at least 27 people is the latest in a long list of shipping accidents in the Philippines. The body count from these shipping disasters speaks for itself with 5,590 confrimed kills over the past two decades.
Millions of Filipinos, many of them too poor to afford air fare, use the seas to travel around the archipelago on everything from massive steel-hulled ferries to wooden dugouts with outriggers.
But bad weather, poorly trained crew members, zero maintenance, overloading and poor enforcement of maritime regulations has often resulted in tragedy.
Below is the list of recorded shipping accidents in the Philippines over the past two decades.
* December 26, 2009: Twenty seven passengers are confirmed dead affter ferry MV Baleno-9 sinks after water enters its bow.
* December 24, 2009: Four people are confirmed dead with 23 others still missing as the wooden-hulled Catalyn B with 73 people on board collides with a fishing boat at the mouth of Manila Bay.
* September 6, 2009: Nine people are killed after the Superferry 9 tilts sharply and then sinks near Zamboanga City.
* May 2009: The Wooden-hulled Commander 6 cracks open and sinks just south of Manila, leaving 12 dead and scores missing.
* December 2008: The ferry Maejan capsizes off northern Philippines, leaving 30 dead.
* November 2008: Don Dexter Kathleen, a small wooden-hulled ferry, capsizes in freak winds off Masbate, leaving 42 dead.
* June 2008: The Princess of the Stars ferry sails into a typhoon and capsizes near Sibuyan island. Of the 850 on board, only 57 survived.
* February 2004: Islamist militants firebomb the Superferry 14 near Manila Bay, leaving 116 dead.
* April 2000: The cargo vessel Anahanda, overloaded with passengers, sinks off the southern island of Jolo. killing an estimated 150 people on board.
* September 1998: The Princess of the Orient ferry sinks off Batangas City south of Manila. 150 perish.
* December 1994: A Singaporean freighter hits the ferry Cebu City in Manila Bay, leaving 140 dead.
* October 1988: The Dona Marilyn ferry sinks off the central island of Leyte, leaving more than 250 dead.
* December 1987: The Dona Paz ferry collides with an oil tanker off Mindoro island near Manila, leaving more than 4,000 dead in the world's worst peacetime shipping disaster.(By Mark Rimas)

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