Manila: Divers have stopped picking bodies out of the sunken ferry St Thomas Aquinas while a salvage team gets to work siphoning off oil on the ship. Divers have thus far plucked 114 bodies from the vessel, which collided with the Sulpicio Express Siete on August 16.
The salvage tug Trabajador 1, operated by Nippon Salvage and Malayan Towage, arrived on Saturday at the Mactan channel near Cebu to siphon the oil left inside the sunken ferry.
The ship is lying some 50 m underwater at the seabed on its port side.
Siphoning started today and will run for around 12 days.
The full details of the accident investigation are expected to be released soon. [09/09/13]
