Three foreign women were killed and one other tourist remains missing after a packed speed boat capsized off the popular Thai holiday island of Koh Samui, police said yesterday.
The boat, which was carrying 32 tourists plus four crew, flipped over on Thursday afternoon and tossed its passengers into the sea after it was slammed by a wave near a rocky stretch of coast in the Gulf of Thailand.
The bodies of a 28-year-old British woman and a 29-year-old German woman were retrieved that afternoon, according to local officials, and the body of a third tourist was discovered yesterday morning.
“It was a Hong Kong woman in her 30s. Her body was found at 10.30am (330 GMT) some 500m from the accident site,” Thanakorn Pattananun, the head of the island’s tourist police, told AFP.
A team of 50 rescue workers in seven boats were scouring the area for a British man who is still missing, he said.
Police have charged the Thai captain of the Ang Thong Explorer speedboat with negligence that led to deaths and injuries, a crime that carries up to 10 years in prison.
“Weather was the cause of the accident because it created high waves, but the boat was also being driven at a high speed,” Apichart Boonsriro, the commander of Surat Thani provincial police, told AFP.
The speedboat was returning the tourists from a trip to a string of nearby islands and was only a few metres from a pier when it capsized, trapping some of the passengers under its hull.
Only one of the deceased was found wearing a life jacket, said the province’s governor, who has called on authorities to “strictly” enforce laws that require boat passengers to wear life vests.
The regulation is rarely respected on the notoriously reckless speed boats that ferry tourists around Thailand’s famed beaches and often lack an adequate supply of life vests.
“If tourists refuse to wear [life vests] then crew should not allow them onto the boat,” said the governor, Wongsiri Phromchana.
Three passengers – from the UK, Australia and Romania – have been hospitalised on the island for injuries sustained during the accident, said staff at Samui hospital.
The United Kingdom’s Foreign Office confirmed the death of a British woman on Thursday and said it was assisting her family.
A spokeswoman said they were aware of another British national in hospital for injuries suffered in the same incident, but did not make reference to a third citizen.
“We remain in contact with local authorities in Thailand for further information,” she said.
Tourism is a key source of revenue for Thailand, but accidents involving tourists are common in a country where safety regulations are often weakly enforced.
In recent years the kingdom’s reputation as a tourist haven has been tarnished by bus and boat accidents, political violence and crimes against foreigners.
In January a speedboat struck and killed a French tourist while she was snorkelling in waters reserved for swimmers off a Thai island in Krabi province.