The capsize of a passenger ferry on the Nile River in northern Sudan has left at least 15 people dead, with rescuers still searching for six others after the vessel sank in Shendi district, according to a medical group that tracks the conflict in the country.
The Sudan Doctors Network said the ferry was carrying at least 27 people, including women and children, when it went down in Nile River province on Wednesday. The group said at least 15 bodies had been recovered and that six people survived. Residents and rescue teams were still searching for those unaccounted for.
The disaster comes on a waterway where overloaded boats are a familiar hazard and safety rules are often ignored, but it is unfolding in a country already under severe strain from war. That broader backdrop makes the search and recovery effort more difficult and underscores the limited margins for emergency response outside Sudan’s biggest urban centers.
The medical group called on authorities to deploy specialized rescue teams and equipment to speed the search. Its statement suggests that even the immediate death toll may not be final, since the group said the count remains provisional while missing passengers are still being sought.
The ferry sank in the Shendi district, in northern Nile River province, an area that lies along one of the country’s most important transport corridors. The incident is another reminder of how vulnerable river travel can be in places where passengers depend on crowded boats to move between communities and where enforcement of safety standards can be weak.
No immediate official casualty update beyond the medical group’s figures was included in the packet, and the report did not provide a detailed explanation for why the ferry capsized. Still, the core facts are clear: a passenger ferry carrying families on the Nile overturned, at least 15 people died, six survived, and search teams were still working to account for the rest.
The accident adds to a pattern of transport disasters in Sudan that can quickly become mass-casualty events when rescue capacity is limited. In this case, the number of people on board was already above two dozen, and the reported survival count shows how quickly a routine river crossing can turn fatal when a vessel goes down.
For families waiting on shore, the toll remains open-ended until the missing are found. For authorities, the immediate task is to recover any survivors and confirm whether the provisional death toll rises further as the search continues.
