RITCHIE Tayongtong's husband refused to let her give up when she fell and hit a railing as the ferry lurched to one side in the howling typhoon.
He told her not to panic and gave the order to jump as the sea rose up to swallow them.
But when she was pulled aboard a liferaft, the man she called "Love" was nowhere to be seen, becoming one of the 800 people missing since the vessel capsi
zed on Saturday during a storm that hit the Philippines.
Hopes were rapidly fading last night of finding more survivors as powerful waves limited rescue efforts.
Divers heard no response yesterday when they hammered on the tip of the 23,824-ton Princess of the Stars, which is still jutting from the water off Sibuyan island in the central Philippines, but officials have refused to give up. "We're not ruling out that somebody there is still alive," said Admiral Wilfredo Tamayo, the head of the coastguards. "You can never tell."
Officials were pinning their hopes on two teams of military divers being able to find an underwater opening today. "We'll do this at the earliest opportunity, weather permitting," Mr Tamayo said.
Experts were also studying the ferry's layout in case they have to drill an access hole, a prospect complicated by a cargo of bunker oil on the ferry that could quickly turn the human disaster into an environmental one if it starts leaking.
Only 38 wave-battered survivors from the ferry have been found so far, including 28 who drifted at sea for more than 24 hours, first in a liferaft, then in lifejackets, before they were found on Sunday about 80 miles to the north in the Mulanay township, in the eastern Quezon province.
However, bodies were washing up on shore to the west and north-west, too.
The coastguard said it was checking a survivor's report that at least one group of people – some dead, some alive – had been spotted in the sea.
Ms Tayongtong, an ex-teacher, married seaman Ephraim Tayongtong in 2000. With no children, her 36-year-old husband was heading to South Korea next month for a job and the couple had been going home to Cebu after he submitted the necessary work documents in Manila.
"We sensed there was trouble around lunchtime," she said. "The ship was bobbing left and right sharply. One time, it was not able to recover and the ship listed to the left side and did not bounce back.
"My husband knew what to do. He told me we should go to the emergency exit."
From the room they shared with other people on the top, seventh level, they donned life-jackets and rushed up to the sun deck, where many people already had gathered.
"I slipped and fell to the ground and hit the railings because the ship was listing," she said, her face bruised from the fall. "I yelled at my husband to go ahead and leave me, but he crawled back and pleaded that I should not lose hope. He told me not to panic because he was there and he would take care of me. The ship then was listing very sharply and we had to hold on to the railings.
"When the sea was almost upon us, he yelled, 'jump, jump!' and we jumped together, but I got under water and many were tugging at me, pulling me under water. When I surfaced later, my husband was nowhere to be found.
"When they helped me up into the liferaft, I wept. I yelled 'Love! Love! Love!' but there was no reply, nothing. The others on the raft asked me just to pray so he'll survive."
The vessel was carrying 845 passengers and crew. The capacity was listed as 1,992 people.
While some relatives tearfully waited for news, others angrily questioned why the ship was allowed to leave Manila late on Friday for a 20-hour trip to Cebu with a typhoon approaching.
The government ordered the ship's owners, Sulpicio Lines, to suspend services pending an investigation into the accident and a check of its other ships' seaworthiness. Debate also began anew on safe-sailing rules in a country prone to storms – Fengshen was the seventh typhoon this year – and dependent on ferries to get around the sprawling archipelago.
Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, the president, said the ferry never should have left port, but Sulpicio Lines said it had sailed with coastguard approval. The company said it will give 200,000 pesos (£2,287) in compensation to relatives of each person who died, along with financial assistance to the survivors.
