At least 41 dead, 49 rescued after boat capsizes on Lake Tanganyika in DRC

At least 41 people have died and 49 others have been rescued after a passenger boat capsized on Lake Tanganyika in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a provincial official said, as search teams continued to look for missing passengers.

Norris Mulongoyi, the provincial transport minister for Tanganyika province, told The Associated Press that search operations were under way to locate those still unaccounted for.

The boat was reportedly carrying about 100 people and cargo when it went down near Mapera, a Congolese village on the lake. The vessel was traveling from the port of Kigoma in Tanzania to the city of Kalemie in DRC when it sank on Thursday.

Survivor Annie Moyoni told Radio Okapi, a UN-backed Congolese broadcaster, that passengers were awakened at about 1 a.m. and discovered the boat tilting to one side. The cause of the capsizing remains unclear.

The disaster is the latest in a long pattern of deadly boat accidents in DRC, where hundreds of people have been killed in recent years, AP reported. Many vessels operate overloaded and without enough life jackets, making even routine crossings perilous.

For many Congolese, boat travel is not a leisure option but a necessity. DRC, one of the world's poorest countries, lacks sufficient road and rail infrastructure for its more than 100 million people, and water routes are often the cheapest way to move people and goods.

The sinking also marks the second loss of a Congolese vessel on the Kigoma-Kalemie route in less than a month. On Aug. 28, the Congolese vessel MV Pacifique caught fire and exploded at the port of Kigoma while loading fuel, Radio Okapi reported. Six crew members were killed and a seventh was reported missing, the broadcaster said, citing port authorities. The vessel had operated between Kigoma and Kalemie and was used to transport fuel.

Earlier, in July, at least 20 people died when a wooden boat carrying students returning from state exams sank in central DRC.

Taken together, the incidents underscore the risks facing passengers who depend on congested, loosely regulated vessels across the region's lakes and rivers. They also highlight the need for stronger enforcement of loading limits, better maintenance and broader access to safety equipment.