I remembered this catastrophe recently when I have seen a documentary at TV5 International (a French channel) about a village on Carabane island in Casamance province, Senegal, Africa (former French colony) where Le Joola ferry was their only link with Dakar, the capital...But in 2002 the ferry capsized and 1,863 persons perished and 64 survived. The ferry was planned to transport only 500 passengers. In the documentary the number of casualty was 3000. Some survived a tie inside the ferry but the rescue came too late. Nobody was punished. Only those invited to a wedding in that day survived from an entire village.
The sinking of Le Joola is thought to be the second-worst non-military maritime disaster in number of lives lost. The first is considered to be the MV Doña Paz in 1987 with an estimated number of over 4,000 dead. The RMS Titanic, which sank in 1912 with 1,517 lives lost, would be third according to the World Almanac and the New York Times. (from Wikipedia)