Officials and locals
said on Wednesday that at least 16 Yemenis, including 11 women and three
children, died and 12 were saved after two boats capsized in separate events
off Yemen's western shores.
As their boat sank in
strong winds off Khokha on Wednesday morning, two Yemeni fishermen perished and
two others survived, a local fisherman informed Arab News.
The event happened
after a boat carrying at least 25 people, which is suspected to have been
overcrowded, sank on Monday afternoon close to Kamaran Island, leaving at least
14 people dead.
According to reports,
the boat that capsized on Monday was transporting people from the coastal town
of Khuba in the western province of Hodeidah to a wedding on Kamaran.
The only people who
survived were guys who could swim, according to a Khuba local who desired to
remain anonymous, while all the women and three children perished.
They said that
residents had promptly raised the alarm after learning of the boat's
disappearance five hours after it had left.
The resident
continued, "The trip from Khuba to Kamaran typically takes an hour and a
half, and no such catastrophe has occurred since the 1980s.
Local coastguards and
fisherman spotted the missing boat and started retrieving victims from the sea
early on Tuesday morning.
Three children and
eleven women were found dead in the water on Tuesday, according to a statement
from the Houthi authorities, who govern the island and Khuba. Eleven other
people were saved.