Survivors of the Philippines ferry disaster clung to a liferaft for 22 hours in treacherous seas before coming ashore "paralysed with exhaustion".
Just 50 passengers are believed to have survived after The Princess of Stars sailed into the centre of Typhoon Fengshen and capsized and sank on Saturday with 862 people onboard.
Most of those recovering at hospital in Lucene were on a single inflatable liferaft. Among them was Jimmy Relativo, 26, who was travelling with his pregnant 22-year-old fiancee, Roselyn Ligan, to get married at her home.
"Before noon we heard screaming and we felt that the boat was capsizing," he said, dazed and emotionless. "Everyone was panicking and the boat tipped over.
"I was saying ‘jump!' but I slipped and went into the water without her. I tried to look for her. I was calling her name but I didn't see her. There were many people in the water. I saw children without lifevests. They were screaming, crying, and I was also crying because I was thinking about my fiancee.
"In the lifeboat I was still praying that I would see her."
He has since heard that a pregnant woman has been found alive. "I don't want to get my hopes up," he said.
Vincente Bernas, a 59-year-old electrician, was with his son Vincent, 25, when the ferry sank. "I told Vincent ‘we have to jump'," said Mr. Bernas, who recalled the rain being so heavy that, even at midday, it was impossible to see those shouting for help.
"I was looking for something to hold on to. I saw a liferaft and went inside looking for my son, but I did not see him."
Also on the raft was Susan Lisbo, 43, who was travelling with her missing niece. "The first raft I reached I shouted ‘Help! Help!' but nobody helped me," she said.
Instead, she was pulled aboard a second raft -- a twist of fate that saved her life as the first liferaft did not make it to safety. On board the second craft a group of merchant seamen, veterans of long voyages to such distant ports as Liverpool, saved the occupants with their skill.
"They maintained the rubber boat even though the waves were as big as a house," said Miss Lisbo.
For 22 hours, in waist-deep water, the survivors frantically bailed out the inflatable craft with their shoes while the sailors taught them how to balance their weight. Eventually the liferaft capsized 30 yards from the shore. Two passengers who had removed their lifevests drowned.
"That was the hardest time for me," said Miss Lisbo, who cannot swim. "When we made it ashore I couldn't even raise my hand. I was paralysed with exhaustion."
The Philippines Red Cross said at least 155 people were killed by flooding on land, and three provinces have been declared in "a state of calamity" with hundreds of thousands of people displaced.
Navy divers hope, but do not expect, to find survivors in air pockets when they cut their way into the ship on Monday.
The government blamed the tragedy on the ferry company, Sulpicio Lines, which has suffered four disasters in 20 years. But the firm was still selling tickets Monday, despite being banned from operating. It has offered pounds 2,250 to the families of the dead.
Ms. Lisbo also blamed the company, saying that the order to abandon ship came too late for the economy passengers on lower decks.
"There were lots of children who were not able to make it," she said. "I will never be able to forget it."
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