Early in the Sunday morning, December 2, the Indonesian-flagged passenger RoRo vessel, 'Gerbang Samudra I', caught on fire. At the time of the incident, the vessel which had left Surabaya, Java was heading to the port of Banarmasin in Kalimantan. The crew noticed a fire on the vessel and proceeded to wake up the passengers, most of whom were asleep at the time, before moving them to the back of the ship.
The RoRo sent out a distress call that was picked up by a passing vessel, the 'KM Kumala', which rushed to the scene and the 'Kumala' managed to rescue most of the people on the vessel.
Approximately 145 individuals were successfully taken onboard. Unfortunately, there are 3 people missing and possibilities finding them are very low as it is assumed that they were trapped inside the ship while it was completely on fire. The missing people are the ship’s captain and two cadets.
Several passengers and members of the crew were rushed to a local hospital due to suffering a combination of burns, bruises and fractures.
