2 dead and 5 missing after a boat collision on the Danube River in Hungary

Hungarian police reported late Saturday night that a man with a head injury was found on the shore of the Danube near Veroce, approximately 30 miles (50 kilometers) north of Budapest. The bodies of a man and a woman were later discovered nearby.

Hours after beginning their search, police found a damaged boat in the water and towed it ashore. They are still searching for five adults — three men and two women — who are believed to have been on the boat.

Police determined that a river cruise boat was in the area at the time of the accident. They stopped a cruise boat with a damaged hull near Komarom, more than 50 miles (80 kilometers) further upriver.

Hungarian public television station M1 reported that the cruise boat, Heidelberg, is a 109-meter (357-foot) Swiss craft that can accommodate 110 people. No passengers on that boat sustained injuries, M1 said.

The Danube at Veroce is roughly 1,500 feet (460 meters) wide and is in the center of the Danube Bend, where the river makes a sweeping, nearly 90-degree turn to the south. This area is a popular recreational and boating destination and is a common route for cruise boats between Budapest and Vienna, some 140 miles (230 kilometers) upriver.

This accident comes five years after a similar tragedy in Budapest, where at least 27 people were killed when a river cruise boat collided with a smaller tourist vessel. The tourist boat Hableany, carrying 35 mostly South Korean tourists, was overtaken by the much larger cruise boat Viking Sigyn, sinking it in seconds beneath Budapest’s Margit Bridge in May 2019. The Ukrainian captain of the Viking Sigyn was found guilty of negligence leading to a fatal mass catastrophe and sentenced to five years and six months in prison, a decision he has appealed.

On Sunday, police initiated criminal proceedings against an unknown perpetrator on suspicion of endangering water transport and causing the death of several people.

A spokesperson for the Directorate General for Disaster Management told Hungarian news agency MTI that a group of nearly 90 people from various regional disaster management agencies were conducting the search for the missing by land, water, and air. Twelve boats, three drones, and two rescue divers are involved in the search, according to Imre Doka.