MV Princess Ashika
Photograph of MV Princess Ashika pierside at Natovi Landing, 31 August 2008. By John Ray.
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| History | |
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| Name: | MV Olive Maru No. 1 |
| Builder: | Shikoku Dockyard, Takamatsu, Japan |
| Yard number: | 757 |
| Completed: | July 1972 |
| Identification: | IMO number: 7234002 |
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| Name: | MV Princess Ashika |
| Owner: |
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| Christened: | 1985 |
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| Name: | MV Princess Ashika |
| Owner: | Shipping Corporation of Polynesia Ltd |
| In service: | 7 July 2009 |
| Identification: | Call sign 3DSD |
| Fate: | Sank 5 August 2009 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Ferry (RORO) |
| Tonnage: | 690 GT (gross tonnage) |
| Displacement: | 223 metric tons deadweight (DWT) |
| Length: | 50.5 m (165 ft 8 in) |
| Beam: | 13.2 m (43 ft 4 in) |
| Crew: | 30 |
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 View from the car deck, 2005.
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Pierside at Natovi Landing, August 2008.
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Photo gallery at the New Zealand Herald.
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Slideshow of wreck from the Otago Daily Times
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The MV Princess Ashika was an inter-island ferry which operated in the South Pacific kingdom of Tonga. This motorized vessel (MV) was built in 1972, and began sailing the Tongan route on 7 July 2009 only to sink less than a month later on 5 August. Official figures released by Operation Ashika on 19 August 2009, confirmed that 54 men were rescued, and 74 persons were lost at sea. These include two bodies recovered and 72 missing (68 passengers and 4 crew), including five foreign nationals. Two of the missing passengers remain unidentified.
Tonga's transportation minister, Paul Karalus, resigned six days after the tragedy.
The ferry was completed in July 1972 at the Shikoku Dockyard in Takamatsu, Japan, and was named MV Olive Maru No. 1. In 1985, she was renamed MV Princess Ashika after the only daughter of a Fijian operator named Raj Naidu who operated a shipping company named North West Shipping and who imported the ship to Fiji in 1985 from Nagasaki, Japan. In 1989 and after initial coup era in Fiji, Mr Naidu sold the ship to the Patterson Brothers Shipping Company Limited who continued to operate this ship for the following 20 years prior to it being sold to the Tongan government. Due to concerns by the Tongan government over the physical status and safety of the existing inter-island ferry, the MV Olovaha, the Princess Ashika was ordered from Fiji to replace the Olovaha at which time it was purchased by Shipping Corporation of Polynesia Ltd. The use of the Princess Ashika was intended to be a stop-gap measure until a new boat funded by a NZD$35 million grant from Japan was to replace it in 2011. Shipping Corporation of Polynesia Ltd had stated less than two months before the disaster that the ship was in "good" condition and that it had been well maintained.
The ferry was travelling from the capital of Tonga, Nukuʻalofa, to Ha'afeva when it sent out a mayday call just before 2300 hours on 5 August 2009, followed by a distress beacon. The distress beacon was sent five minutes after the mayday call. One survivor described a "big wave" and "much water", claiming that it had happened very quickly. When it sank, the ferry had only made five voyages in its new role.
A P-3 Orion plane from the Royal New Zealand Air Force located a trail of wreckage 86 kilometres (53 mi) northeast of Nukuʻalofa. When darkness fell, search boats ceased searching for fear of sailing over survivors in the water.
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Wikipedia