BEGIN VIDEOTAPE, DECEMBER 14, 1991) JOHN SWEENEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The ferry boat, carrying hundreds of passengers and crew, many returning from a religious pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia, was swept up by 10-foot waves and heaved against the reefs in the shark-infested Red Sea, nearly 300 miles southeast of Cairo.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We heard big noise under the ship, something like big rocks. Then there was commotion and the people are coming out of their cabins.</s>SWEENEY: Officials fear over 450 passengers may have drowned. At least two U.S. helicopters, from ships involved in the embargo against Iraq, have joined in the attempt to locate the ferry's estimated 650 passengers and crew. Egyptian officials say more than 150 survivors were picked up before nightfall off the Egyptian coast. The 1100-ton ferry was en route from Jetta, Saudi Arabia to Egypt, when it was tossed by high waves and 40-mile-an-hour winds against the coral reef. It went down immediately. Egyptian officials are hopeful that some passengers may have escaped in lifeboats that were driven away from the coast by the high winds.
CNN 20: Egyptian Ferry Sinks, December 14, 1991