UPDATE | Death toll in Zimbabwe ferry capsizing rises to 80

Another eight bodies were retrieved from Zimbabwe’s Lake Kariba on Sunday to take the death toll from this week’s ferry capsizing to 80, police said.

The overloaded passenger ferry run by the government’s Rural Infrastructure Development Agency (RIDA) overturned in choppy waters on Tuesday in a rare accident on the vast lake on the border with Zambia.

Deadliest ferry disaster

“The Kariba RIDA boat accident death toll is now 80 following the recovery of eight more bodies on 16th August 2026,” the police said in a statement.

It is believed to be the country’s deadliest such disaster.

Search teams recovered 25 bodies on Saturday, taking the toll to 72.

Police gave no details of the new victims but most of the passengers on the vessel were villagers and fish traders who lived around the lake, many from the Chalala fishing camp.

Officials say the boat was authorised to carry 90 people but was packed with 114 adults, five crew members and an unspecified number of children.

The civil protection unit said on Wednesday that 77 people had been rescued.

With the 80 bodies that police said they had recovered, this would mean the vessel was carrying 157 people.

Officials have not said how many children were among the dead.

The youngest victim identified so far was one-year-old Wendy Ndandarika.

Vital link

The ferry was a vital link for rural communities living around the lake to the town of Kariba, nearly 280km northwest of the capital Harare.

Hundreds of people gathered at the district hospital in Kariba on Saturday to identify the bodies of their relatives and loved ones.