It is on the news here every night. It goes to show how little oversight exists. Look at the last two years and all the cruise ship problems: Royal Caribian Explorer 700 passengers crew violently ill with intestinal virus; Carnival Triumph's engineroom fire which left the ship, crew and over 3,000 passengers with no electricity, little food, few working toilets to the point where raw sewerage was sloshing through the hallways and, somewhat similiar, the Costa Concordia hitting a rock off the Italian coast and turning over. That little whoops cost 32 people their lives, except the Captian and crew who were the first off the ship.
As far as Ferry-type ships are concerned...have your Will written and plot picked out
Le Joola – On 26 September 2002, the overloaded ferry capsized in rough seas with an estimated death toll of more than 1,800.
Al Salam Boccaccio 98 – On 3 February 2006, the Roll-on/roll-off passenger ferry Al Salam Boccaccio 98 sank in the Red Sea en route from Duba, Saudi Arabia, to Safaga in southern Egypt. The ship was carrying 1,312 passengers and 96 crew. 388 people survived.
Princess of the Stars – On 21 June 2008, the ferry Princess of the Stars capsized and sank in Typhoon Fengshen, off the coast of San Fernando, Romblon, in the Philippines. Of the estimated 747 people aboard, 57 survived.
Nazreen-1 – On 8 July 2003 the passenger ferry sank in the Meghna River. Of 750 people aboard, 220 were rescued
Cahaya Bahari – On 29 June 2000 the overloaded ferry carrying refugees from the Maluku Islands sank in a storm. Of the 491 aboard, 10 were rescued
Salahuddin-2 – On the night of 3 May 2002, the ferry sank in the Meghna River south of Dhaka, Bangladesh, killing more than 450 people.
Senopati Nusantara – The Indonesian ferry sank in a storm on 30 December 2006. She was a scheduled passenger liner from Kumai in Central Kalimantan to Tanjung Emas port in Semarang, East Java. About 22 nautical miles (40 km) off Mandalika island, she sank in a fierce storm in the Java Sea. At least 400–500 people are thought to have died; 224 were rescued.
SIEV X – A boat carrying over 400 asylum seekers to Australia sank on 19 October 2001. 353 people were lost. The Australian government was criticized for not doing anything to help the survivors for three days.
Rabaul Queen – capsized on the morning of 2 February 2012, due to rough conditions in the Solomon Sea. 321 people were lost.
St. Thomas Aquinas – On 16 August 2013, the roll-on/roll-off passenger ferry collided with the cargo ship Sulpicio Express Siete off the coast of Talisay, Cebu, Philippines. It was reported that 55 were dead and 65 were missing
Shariatpur 1 – a double deck ferry that capsized on March 12, 2012, after colliding with a cargo ship on the Meghna River, Bangladesh. At least 116 people died.