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Three killed, including tourists in boat accident
Two foreign tourists died and seven others,
including Australians, were injured when their tourist boat overturned during
heavy winds on Vietnam's picturesque Halong Bay, police say.
A local guide also died in the Thursday evening accident and a Vietnamese
tourist was still missing, said Pham Van Truong, an immigration police officer
in Quang Ninh province.
"We are trying to identify the nationalities of these two foreigners but it will
take us time because there were no documents left on their bodies," Mr Truong
said.
Police recovered the bodies of three victims this morning and were still
searching for the missing Vietnamese, the officer said.
Seven injured tourists from Australia, France and the United States were treated
at nearby Bay Chay Hospital but were released about midday today, said Vu Xuan
Dien, the hospital's director.
The boat was carrying 32 people - 14 foreigners, 10 Vietnamese tourists, the
guide and seven crewmen, the policeman said. He added that the accident may have
been caused by violent winds that occurred while they were at sea.
Halong Bay, located in the Gulf of Tonkin about 160 kilometres east of the
capital Hanoi, was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1994. Its 1600
islands and islets form a spectacular seascape of mostly uninhabited limestone
pillars made famous by the 1992 French movie Indochine.
Numerous tourist boats that ply the waters of the bay offer sleeping and dining
facilities.
Last year 2.65 million tourists, including 1.71 million foreigners, visited
Halong Bay, according to the provincial tourism department.
Source: VietNamNet/AFP |
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