Search continues for South Korean ferry survivors

Emergency services are continuing to search for nearly 300 people missing after a ferry carrying more than 470 people sank off South Korea.

Officials say 179 people have been rescued. Most of the passengers were students from the same high school.

Teams used lights to search overnight but strong currents have hampered divers’ efforts to enter the ship, where it is thought many were trapped.

At least nine people are confirmed to have died, with dozens more injured.

The vessel was travelling from Incheon port, in the north-west, to the southern resort island of Jeju.

It is not yet clear what caused the ship to list at a severe angle and flip over, leaving only a small part of its hull visible above water. The captain was being questioned, Yonhap news agency reported.

Yonhap said the nine dead include four 17-year-old students and a 25-year-old teacher as well as a 22-year-old female crew member. Identities of the other three were not immediately known.

The latest figures say 475 people were on board, with 287 still unaccounted for. Figures issued by the government have changed several times, prompting criticism.

One parent, Park Yung-suk, told the Reuters news agency that she had seen the body of her teenage daughter’s teacher brought ashore earlier in the morning.

“There are parents here who believe there are children who are alive on the boat,” Fawcett said. “People here are really clinging onto that hope.”

“If I could teach myself to dive, I would jump in the water and try to find my daughter,” Park said.

The father of one of the missing passengers meanwhile said he received a text message from his child, saying that there were still survivors in the boat. The child said, “I am alive, there are students alive, please save us quickly”.