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[HOT LINKS] South Korea ferry disaster: What’s the likelihood of finding survivors?

April 18, 2014
Members of the Navy’s ship salvage unit (SSU) search Thursday for missing passengers who were on a ferry that sank off the southwestern coast Wednesday morning. Five hundred and fifty-five Navy, Coast Guard and civilian divers and support personnel are on the scene. / Yonhap

Members of the Navy’s ship salvage unit (SSU) search Thursday for missing passengers who were on a ferry that sank off the southwestern coast Wednesday morning. Five hundred and fifty-five Navy, Coast Guard and civilian divers and support personnel are on the scene. / Yonhap

[CNN] – As rescuers take on the daunting task of finding survivors, family members of the missing passengers are pinning slim hopes on floundering air pockets in the capsized South Korean ferry.

They know the odds aren’t in their favor, particularly after the entire ferry went underwater Friday. But they point to one especially miraculous tale of survival for their reason for not giving up.

In May 2013, a tug boat carrying a 12-person crew capsized off the coast of Nigeria. Two divers sent to recover the bodies assumed everyone aboard had died. After all, the boat was about 100 feet down under the Atlantic Ocean.

Three days had passed. And when a diver reached for a hand he thought belonged to a corpse, he discovered it was Harrison Okene, the boat’s cook.

Okene had survived 60 hours in a 4-foot space — a tiny air bubble — where he’d taken shelter.   [READ MORE]