Boat with 150 asylum-seekers capsizes off Australia

FILE – In this July 4, 2012 file photo released by the Indonesian National Search and Rescue Agency, a wooden boat which is believed to have up to 180 asylum seekers on board floats on the waters off Christmas Island, Australia. Australian officials said Saturday, July 13, 2013, a boat carrying asylum seekers from Indonesia to Australia began sinking Saturday in the Indian Ocean. Australian officials rescued 88 asylum seekers on Friday night after the boat began taking on water about 200 kilometers (120 miles) north of Christmas Island, an Australian territory 500 kilometers (310 miles) south of Jakarta, Indonesia. (AP Photo/Indonesian National Search and Rescue Agency, File)

SYDNEY — A boat carrying some 150 asylum-seekers capsized off Christmas Island Tuesday but the Australian navy saved most of them, rescuers said.

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority said two navy ships were at the scene 70 nautical miles off the island, which is northwest of the Australian mainland.

“There were around 150 people on board,” an AMSA spokesman told AFP, after an earlier tweet from the authority said up to 180 were on the boat.

“When it capsized, two naval vessels were at the scene and were able to get the vast majority of them out of the water very quickly,” he added.

The spokesman said he could not confirm whether anyone died and the cause of the sinking was not immediately known.

The boat had earlier made a distress call and was being escorted to Christmas Island by HMAS Albany when it tipped over in bad weather.

Reports said few of the people on board were wearing lifejackets at the time and a Royal Australian Air Force plane dropped life rafts to those in trouble.

“We’d been in contact with the vessel most of the day and the navy was travelling with it to Christmas Island,” the spokesman said, adding that rough seas had prevented sailors from boarding the boat.

Hundreds of asylum-seekers have drowned on the dangerous sea voyage to Australia in recent years when their rickety and overloaded boats sank.

More than 13,000 asylum-seekers have arrived in Australia by boat since January 1, piling pressure on the ruling Labor party in an election year.