Three persons have been confirmed dead while 245 others were rescued overnight by fishing boats and passing ships from a burning ferry in southern Philippines.

This is even as the coast guard continued their search on Wednesday for more bodies and survivors, although it was not clear if anyone was missing. Among the dead were a one-year-old girl.

The ship’s manifest had 36 crew members and 136 passengers on board, 28 of them children. The coast guard said investigators would ask the ferry owner and skipper to explain the discrepancy between the listed occupants and the number of rescued persons. 

Photographs of the incident showed passengers wearing orange life vests waiting to be rescued at the loading bay of the ferry which also carried some vehicles.

Local news reports quoted some passengers as saying that they jumped into the choppy waters in panic and were rescued by passing cargo and fishing vessels.

“We did not have any patrol ship in the area so we alerted nearby ships and boats to render assistance because it was an emergency. It’s good that a number of ships immediately responded. We have to recognize what they did,” coast guard spokesman, Armand Balilo said. 

He disclosed that search and rescue efforts were continuing, adding that it was unclear whether there were still people missing as no relatives have approached authorities to report any.

The fire reportedly started in the engine room and consumed almost the entire vessel but the M/V Lite Ferry 16 remained afloat, about 3 kilometers off a port in Zamboanga del Nor where it was heading after departing Santander town in central Cebu Province on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, ferries in northern Philippines have been warned not to go to sea after  fast-moving storms, accompanied by heavy overnight rain blew across the main island of Luzon.

Sea accidents are common in the Philippine archipelago due to frequent storms, badly maintained boats, overcrowding and weak enforcement of safety regulations.

In December 1987, the ferry Dona Paz sank after colliding with a fuel tanker, killing more than 4,341 people in the world’s worst maritime disaster.