In Tanzania, a passenger ferry named MV Nyerere capsized on Victoria Lake, one of the largest lakes in the world, killing at least 136 people.
Initial estimates suggested that the ferry was carrying more than 400 people when it went down on Thursday afternoon while its capacity was only 100 persons and only 37 people had been rescued so far.
Accidents in the lake surrounded by Tanzania, Kenya, and Uganda are usually due to the fact that the ferries are old and in bad condition.
Tanzania has been hit by several major ferry disasters over the years. At least 500 people were killed when a ferry capsized in Lake Victoria in 1996. In 2012, 145 people died when a ferry sank off the shore of Tanzania's Indian Ocean archipelago of Zanzibar.
ILKHA