January 1981 - January 27, 1981 (Tuesday)

January 27, 1981 (Tuesday)

  • Tampomas II disaster: 580 people drowned when the Indonesian passenger ferry KM Tampomas II sank in the Java Sea during a storm. Of 1,136 onboard(sic), 566 were rescued, including 152 who were found in lifeboats days afterward. Operated by the Pelni line, the ship was a roll-on/roll-off (ro-ro) ferryboat that had caught fire midway through its voyage from Jakarta to Makassar. The fire was extinguished, but the engines failed and the ship was adrift and awaiting a rescue when a storm arose. Before the ship could be fully evacuated, it capsized, going completely beneath the waters at 1:42 in the afternoon Central Indonesian time (0542 GMT).

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    Here lies interred in the eternity of the past, from whence there is no resurrection for the days—whatever there may be for the dust—the thirty-third year of an ill-spent life, which, after a lingering disease of many months sank into a lethargy, and expired, January 22d, 1821, A.D. leaving a successor inconsolable for the very loss which occasioned its existence.
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