Business Insider: by Manuel Mogato.

CEBU, Philippines (Reuters) – A Philippine ferry sank after colliding with a cargo vessel killing at least 24 people and leaving nearly 300 missing, the coast guard said on Saturday.

Some 572 people were rescued after Friday’s accident at the mouth of a channel approaching the port of Cebu in the central Philippines, said the coast guard.

“We are still looking for 274 people,” acting coast guard chief Rear Admiral Luis Tuason told local radio. “There are still so many missing and the suspicion is there may be some people left inside the ship.”

Scores, sometimes hundreds, of people die each year in ferry accidents in the Philippines, an archipelago of 7,100 islands, which has a notoriously poor record for maritime safety.

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