The ferry which sank off the coast of Kyrenia in August had suffered malfunctions in its power generator, its exhaust and to its steering, according to conversations recorded by its black box, the Turkish Cypriot Kyrenia district court heard on Friday, as the case against the nine people arrested in the disaster’s aftermath continued.
According to newspaper Yeniduzen, a police representative old the court of the conversations, and said that in a separate recorded conversation, the ship’s first mate, who is among the nine defendants, said that “the boat needs a complete overhaul”.
Regarding the steering malfunction, the representative said that a conversation had been recorded in which an individual said that the boat had “come very close to another vessel” during a previous voyage as a result of the steering issue.
Additionally, the representative told the court that the black box also contained a recording of a conversation in which it was said that “another captain” had crashed the ship in the town of Yumurtalik, in Turkey’s Adana province.
The representative said that the identity of that captain “has been determined”.
Three-year-old girl still missing after disaster
Away from the matter of the black box, the representative said that parts of the boat which have been recovered are now being examined by naval engineers, and that an investigation has been launched into the conduct of a mechanic “who is believed to have known about all of the boat’s malfunctions” but is not currently a suspect.
At the end of the day’s proceedings, all nine suspects – the boat’s captain, Mustafa Oz, seven other members of the boat’s crew, and one director of its operating company, Filo Denizcilik – all had their remands extended for a further seven days. They will now remain in custody until the case’s next hearing on October 23.
Meanwhile, the families of the dead and the missing gathered outside the courthouse in Kyrenia on Friday morning ahead of the day’s hearing, demanding justice for their lost loved ones.
The ferry sank shortly after midday on August 30, after having set sail from the new port of Kyrenia to the Turkish port of Tasucu with 259 passengers and eight members of crew on board. A total of 27 people are confirmed to have died as a result of the incident, while one passenger – three-year-old Anni Asel Hilaloglu – remains unaccounted for.