Tanzania ferry accident: 136 dead after overcrowded boat capsizes on Lake Victoria

At least 136 people were killed after a ferry carrying hundreds capsized on Lake Victoria in Tanzania.

Anxious families watched as body after body was pulled from the capsized ferry that officials said was badly overcrowded.

President John Magufuli said it was “a great disaster for our nation” and declared four days of national mourning.

He said that the ferry’s captain had been detained because he allegedly left the steering to someone who had insufficient training. The president ordered the arrests of all those responsible as a criminal investigation began.

The MV Nyerere ferry’s capacity was 101 people but the ferry had been overloaded when it capsized on Thursday afternoon, the government's Chief Secretary John Kijazi told reporters.

At least 40 people were rescued. It is feared that more than 200 people in total have drowned.

Dozens of security workers and volunteers wearing gloves and face masks had resumed work at daybreak on Friday after suspending efforts overnight, hauling bodies into wooden boats.

It was obvious that more bodies were trapped in the overturned ferry, the president said, according a Citizen newspaper report. He said even the cargo far exceeded the 25 tonnes allowed.

Tanzanian ferries often carry hundreds of passengers and are overcrowded, and shifts in weight as people move to disembark can become deadly. Images from the scene showed the ferry's exposed underside not far from shore.

Bodies were lined up on plastic sheeting as hundreds of people pressed near the water's edge, watching the search efforts.

Pope Francis, the United Nations secretary-general, Russian President Vladimir Putin and a number of African leaders expressed shock and sorrow.

"His Holiness Pope Francis expresses his heartfelt solidarity with those who mourn the loss of their loved ones and who fear for the lives of those still missing," the condolence telegram said, according to the Vatican.

The MV Nyerere, named for the former president who led the East African nation to independence, was travelling between the islands of Ukara and Ukerewe when it sank, according to the government agency in charge of servicing the vessels.

Worried residents on Friday waited for any word of survivors.

"We try to make calls to friends, relatives," a local guide, Paschal Phares, told the AP news agency. He recalled how crowded his trip on the aging ferry had been last month: "Most of us were standing up. It was full."

Accidents are often reported on the large freshwater lake surrounded by Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda. Some of the deadliest have occurred in Tanzania, where passenger boats are often said to be old and in poor condition.

In 1996, more than 800 people died when passenger and cargo ferry MV Bukoba sank on Lake Victoria.

Nearly 200 people died in 2011 when the MV Spice Islander I sank off Tanzania's Indian Ocean coast near Zanzibar.