Why did Sewol Sink? – by Park Woon Yong, Year 9, Sayfol International School
A
few days ago, there was a huge disaster in South Korea. It shocked many people.
The thing that made people most upset was the fact that it was not a natural
disaster but human error. There are several reasons why Sewol sank.
Firstly,
they used a dangerous route. The government suggested using a safer way but
they used a different one because the one that the government suggested was
longer. They chose a shorter way because they had departed late and wanted to
make up for lost time. They wanted to shorten the journey even though they knew
that the route was dangerous because the sea was shallower along that way.
There were many strong waves in that area too. This route goes in between two
islands and is not suitable for a big ship like Sewol.
Secondly,
the captain and crew were unskilful and irresponsible. The captain slept most
of the time during the journey. It was a twelve-hour journey but he spent seven
hours in his room. He passed the steering wheel to an unskilful navigation
officer. Even worse, when the ship started to sink, the captain ran out of the
ship first, leaving the passengers behind. He told the passengers to stay where
they were. They wasted a lot of time which could have been used to escape.
Thirdly,
Sewol was carrying too much freight. The crew members didn’t secure the freight
properly. The law states that all freight is to be checked every two hours but
they didn’t. The ship couldn’t remain stable because it was heavy on the right
side due to the weight of the freight. The owners were only interested in
making profit by carrying as much freight as possible. They didn’t think about
the safety of the passengers.
The
disaster has already happened. The only thing we can do now is to do our best
to rescue the people who were on board, even if the possibility of survival is
small. We must make sure that these things do not happen again in the future.
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