Search teams recovered another body from the wreckage of the Filo Jet ferry off Kyrenia, raising the confirmed death toll in the disaster to 14.
The occupied north’s ‘prime minister’, Unal Ustel, announced that the victim has been identified as a man aged approximately 55 to 60, and that efforts to formally identify him are now under way.
Six bodies have been retrieved so far. The number of people still missing has fallen correspondingly to 14, according to a TASS report citing Ustel’s comments to Kibris newspaper.
Ustel also said specialist companies from Turkey are carrying out technical studies to determine whether the Filo Jet wreckage can be raised to the surface, and that a detailed report is expected to be completed by tomorrow evening.
The Filo Jet, a high-speed catamaran, was sailing from occupied Kyrenia to Taşucu in Turkey’s Mersin province on August 30 when it began taking on water shortly after leaving port, capsized and sank roughly 7.5km off the coast, to a depth of around 554 metres. The vessel was carrying 267 people, 259 passengers and eight crew. Turkish and Turkish Cypriot forces launched a joint search and rescue operation, and 239 people were brought ashore alive.
The occupied north’s “transport minister”, Erhan Arikli, was dismissed from his post over the accident, a decision Ustel announced days after the sinking. Arikli’s party subsequently withdrew from the north’s ruling coalition.
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