On December 20, 1987, at 06:30,
Philippine Standard Time,
Doña Paz departed from Tacloban,
Leyte, for Manila, with a stopover at
Catbalogan,
Samar. Commanded by Captain Eusebio Nazareno, the vessel was due in Manila at 04:00 the next day. It was reported that it last made radio contact at about 20:00. At about 22:30, the ferry was at Dumali Point, along the
Tablas Strait, near
Marinduque.
Doña Paz sank within two hours of the collision.
Vector sank within four hours. A four-year-old boy was found drifting in the sea in the immediate days after the collision, but there were conflicting reports on whether he was an actual survivor from the
Doña Paz. A 25th survivor from
Doña Paz, Valeriana Duma, was not originally accounted for by officials. She revealed herself later by the
GMA Network program
Wish Ko Lang! in 2012. At 14, she was the youngest passenger of
Doña Paz to survive. None of the crew of
Doña Paz survived. Most of the survivors sustained burns from jumping into the flaming waters. Other officers were either drinking beer or watching television in the crew's recreation quarters. The ship's captain was reportedly watching a film on his
Betamax machine in his cabin. This theory was given more credibility through statements given by survivor Salvador Bacsal, who spoke of "upbeat music from the recreation quarters", and was corroborated by Luthgardo Niedo, who testified that a fellow constabulary soldier informed him of "an ongoing party with laughter and loud music" on the ship's bridge with the captain as one of the attendees. The Marine Board of Inquiry of the
Philippine Coast Guard, chaired by Capt. Dario Fajardo, performed a fact-finding mission of the sinking and gave its report to Congress on February 29, 1988. The Coalition of Samar and Leyte Organizations (CSLO) made an investigative team composed of professionals and police members from the provinces of Leyte and Samar. Their volunteer members intended to gather information on the ship's journey and passengers. Among the documents that they sought were duplicate tickets given to the passengers. CLSO was officially recognized by the Philippine government to be able to provide assistance to the MV
Doña Paz's victims' relatives. Survivors claimed that it was possible that
Doña Paz may have carried as many as 4,000 passengers. However, an anonymous official of Sulpicio Lines told
UPI that, since it was the Christmas season, tickets were usually purchased illegally aboard the ship at a cheaper rate, and those passengers were not listed on the manifest. Of the 21 bodies that had been recovered and identified as passengers on the ship five days after the accident, only one of the fatalities was listed on the official manifest. Of the 26 passengers who survived, only five were listed on the manifest. On December 28, 1987,
Representative Raul Daza of
Northern Samar claimed that at least 2,000 passengers aboard
Doña Paz were not on the ship's manifest. He based that number on a list of names furnished by relatives and friends of missing people believed aboard the ferry, the names having been compiled by radio and television stations in Tacloban. During February 1988 the
Philippine National Bureau of Investigation stated, on the basis of interviews with relatives, that there were at least 3,099 passengers and 59 crew aboard, giving 3,134 on-board fatalities. During January 1999 a presidential task force report estimated, on the basis of court records and more than 4,100 settlement claims, that there were 4,342 passengers. Subtracting the 26 surviving passengers, and adding 58 crew, gives 4,374 on-board fatalities, almost three times the
design load; adding the 11 dead from the crew of
Vector, the total becomes 4,385.
Pope John Paul II,
Japanese Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita and
Queen Elizabeth II of the
United Kingdom conveyed their official messages of condolence. Given the estimated death toll,
Time magazine and others have termed the sinking of
Doña Paz "the deadliest peacetime maritime disaster of the 20th century". Sulpicio Lines announced three days after the accident that
Doña Paz was insured for (US$ in dollars), and it was willing to
indemnify the survivors the amount of (US$ in dollars) for each victim. Days later, hundreds of the victims' kin staged a mass rally at
Rizal Park, demanding that the ship owners likewise indemnify the families of those not listed on the manifest, as well as to give a full accounting of the missing. • Renato Asisturga, 19 •
Aludía Bacsal, 18, of
Can-avid, Eastern Samar •
Salvador Bacsal, 44, of Can-avid, Eastern Samar • Generoso Batola, 29, of Borongan, Eastern Samar • Samuel Carillo, 27 • Severino Carrion, 25 • Zosimo de la Rama, 21 • Dominador Depayo, 23 • Valeriana Duma, 14 (youngest survivor), of
Catubig,
Northern Samar •
Second Mate Reynaldo Tarife, 41 ==Memorial==