Hundreds of passengers were crowded when the flames broke out on Tuesday, according to Josephine Pacific Lokum, head of the delegation of the region’s national lawmakers.
The disaster was the deepest in the world, near Mbandaka, the capital of Ekotia, at the confluence of Ruki and the vast Congo River.
“The first 131 groups were discovered on Wednesday, and 12 more were caught on Thursday and Friday, some of which are burnt,” Lokumu told AFP.
Joseph Locondo, a local civil society leader, said he helped bury the remains, saying, “We have put the provisional death toll at 145.
Lokumu said the flames were caused by a fuel explosion that was ignited by a cooking fire inside the ship.
“Women illuminated the embers for cooking. The fuel not far away exploded, killing many children and women,” she said.
The total number of passengers on the ship of destiny was unknown, but Rokum said it was in “hundreds.”
Some survivors were rescued and admitted to hospital, Locondo said.
However, he added on Friday that “some families still had no news about their loved ones.”
The Democratic Republic of the Congo, a vast Central African nation, suffers from a lack of viable roads.
As a result, travel often occurs in the lakes, the Congo River and its tributaries.
Chronic absence of passenger lists often complicates search operations.
At least 47 people were killed in October 2023 after Congo sailing a sunken boat in Equateur.
More than 20 people died last October when a boat capsized on Lake Kivu in eastern DRC, local government said.
Another shipwreck on Lake Kivu took about 100 lives in 2019.
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