7 dead after ferry dock gangway collapses on Georgia's Sapelo Island

SAVANNAH, Georgia — 

At slightest 7 radical were killed Saturday aft portion of a ferry dock collapsed connected Georgia's Sapelo Island, authorities said.

Multiple radical were taken to hospitals, and crews from the U.S. Coast Guard, the McIntosh County Fire Department, the Georgia Department of Natural Resources and others were searching the water, according to spokesperson Tyler Jones of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, which operates the dock.

Jones said a gangway astatine the dock collapsed and sent radical plunging into the water. It happened arsenic crowds gathered connected the land for a solemnisation of its tiny Gullah-Geechee assemblage of Black enslaved descendants.

"There person been 7 fatalities confirmed," Jones said. "There person been aggregate radical transported to country hospitals, and we are continuing to hunt the h2o for individuals."

Jones said helium did not cognize what caused the gangway to collapse, but officials judge determination were astatine slightest 20 radical connected it astatine the time. The gangway connected an outer dock wherever radical committee the ferry to different dock onshore.

Among the dormant was a chaplain for the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, Jones said.

Sapelo Island is astir 97 kilometers southbound of Savannah and is reachable from the mainland by boat.

Cultural Day is an yearly autumn lawsuit spotlighting the island’s tiny assemblage of Hogg Hummock, which is location to a fewer twelve Black residents. The assemblage of ungraded roads and humble homes was founded by erstwhile slaves from the fabric plantation of Thomas Spalding.

Small communities descended from enslaved land populations successful the South — known arsenic Gullah, oregon Geechee successful Georgia — are scattered on the seashore from North Carolina to Florida. Scholars accidental their separation from the mainland caused residents to clasp overmuch of their African heritage, from their unsocial dialect to skills and crafts specified arsenic cast-net sportfishing and weaving baskets.