Death toll in Russian boat disaster reaches 100

Divers widened their search for 29 remaining missing boat passengers after the death toll in Russia's worst river disaster in three decades reached 100, the Emergencies Ministry said on Wednesday. Officials say 79 of 208 passengers survived the sinking of an ageing, overcrowded tourist boat when it sank in the Volga River on Sunday. The 29 still unaccounted for are feared dead.
The Bulgaria, a 79-metre river cruiser built in 1955, listed onto its right side during a thunderstorm and sank in minutes in a broad stretch of the Volga in the Tatarstan region, trapping many passengers inside as the vessel sank to the riverbed. "The bodies of 100 people killed have been extracted," said regional Emergency Situations Ministry official Igor Panshin Of the bodies recovered, 18 were of children.