South Korea's president described the actions of a sunken ferry's crew as "unforgivable" and "murderous" Monday as a prosecutor said that four more crew members had been detained on charges that they had allegedly failed to protect the stricken vessel's passengers. 
 
 South Korean President Park Geun-hye made the comments Monday at a Cabinet briefing, saying that the captain and crew "told the passengers to stay put but they themselves became the first to escape, after deserting the passengers." Park added that "legally and ethically, this is an unimaginable act." 
 
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 Senior prosecutor Ahn Sang-don told reporters Monday that two first mates, one second mate and a chief engineer had been accused of abandoning the ship. Ahn says prosecutors are considering whether to ask a court for a formal arrest warrant that would allow for a longer period of investigation. South Koreans can only be detained for 48 hours without a court-issued formal arrest warrant. The ferry's captain and two other crewmembers were previously formally arrested on suspicion of negligence and abandoning people in need. 
 
 The announcement came as the confirmed death toll from Wednesday's sinking reached 86, with approximately 220 of the ship's 476 passengers, many of them high school students on a holiday trip, still missing. Divers gained access to the ship over the weekend and are expected to find more bodies trapped below decks, where passengers had remained, obeying the captain's initial order not to evacuate the vessel. Efforts to reach the capsized vessel had been thwarted for three days by bad weather and strong currents. 
 
 The pace of recovering bodies has accelerated in recent days, since divers finally succeeded in entering the vessel. 
 
 The discovery of bodies has dashed the faint hopes of some families who have gathered on the island of Jindo, near the site of the wreck. Relatives have been asked to identify their loved ones using the slimmest of clues. Many favored hoodies and track pants. One girl painted her fingernails red and toenails black. Another had braces on her teeth. 
 
 Meanwhile, a newly released transcript shows the ship was crippled by confusion and indecision well after it began listing Wednesday. The transcript suggests that the chaos may have added to a death toll that could eventually exceed 300. 
 
 According to the transcript released by South Korea's coast guard, about 30 minutes after the Sewol began tilting a crew member asked a marine traffic controller whether passengers would be rescued if they abandoned ship off South Korea's southern coast. The crew member posed the question three times in succession. 
 
 That followed several statements from the ship that people aboard could not move and another in which someone said that it was "impossible to broadcast" instructions. 
 
 An unidentified official at Jindo Vessel Traffic Services Center told the crew that they should "go out and let the passengers wear life jackets and put on more clothing." 
 
 "If this ferry evacuates passengers, will you be able to rescue them?" the unidentified crew member asked. 
 
 "At least make them wear life rings and make them escape!" the traffic-center official responded. 
 
 "If this ferry evacuates passengers, will they be rescued right away?" the crew member asked again. 
 
 "Don't let them go bare -- at least make them wear life rings and make them escape," the traffic official repeated. "The rescue of human lives from the Sewol ferry ... the captain should make his own decision and evacuate them. We don't know the situation very well. The captain should make the final decision and decide whether you're going to evacuate passengers or not." 
 
 "I'm not talking about that," the crew member said. "I asked -- if they evacuate now, can they be rescued right away?" 
 
 The traffic official then said patrol boats would arrive in 10 minutes, though another civilian ship was already nearby and had told controllers that it would rescue anyone who went overboard. 
 
 The cause of the disaster is not yet known, but prosecutors have said the ship made a sharp turn before it began to list. 
 
 More than 170 people survived the sinking of the Sewol, which had been on its way from the South Korean port city of Incheon to the southern tourist island of Jeju. The captain took more than half an hour to issue an evacuation order, which several passengers have said they never heard. 
 
 Dozens of relatives have started camping out at the port in Jindo to be closer to where the search was taking place, sleeping in tents in the open. Volunteers provided food and drinks and ran cellphone charging stations. A Buddhist monk in white robes stood facing the water and chanted in a calm monotone as several relatives stood behind him, their hands pressed together and heads bowed in prayer. 
 
 Anguished families, fearful they might be left without even their loved ones' bodies, vented rage Sunday over the government's handling of the crisis. 
 
 About 100 relatives attempted a long protest march to the presidential Blue House in Seoul, about 250 miles to the north, saying they wanted to voice their complaints to President Park Geun-hye. They walked for about six hours before police officers in neon jackets blocked a main road. 
 
 "The government is the killer," they shouted as they pushed against a police barricade. 
 
 "We want an answer from the person in charge about why orders are not going through and nothing is being done," said Lee Woon-geun, father of 17-year-old missing passenger Lee Jung-in. "They are clearly lying and kicking the responsibility to others." 
 
 He said relatives are desperate to retrieve bodies before they decompose beyond recognition. 
 
 "After four or five days, the body starts to decay. When it's decayed, if you try to hold a hand, it might fall off," he said. "I miss my son. I'm really afraid I might not get to find his body." 
 
 The Sewol's captain, Lee Joon-seok, 68, was arrested Saturday, along with one of the ship's three helmsmen and the 25-year-old third mate. The third mate was steering at the time of the accident, in a challenging area where she had not steered before, and the captain said he was not on the bridge at the time. 
 
 Senior prosecutor Yang Jung-jin said the third mate has refused to tell investigators why she made the sharp turn. Prosecutors have not named the third mate, but a fellow crew member identified her as Park Han-kyul. 
 
 As he was taken from court in Mokpo on Saturday, the captain explained his decision to wait before ordering an evacuation. 
 
 "At the time, the current was very strong, the temperature of the ocean water was cold," Lee told reporters, describing his fear that passengers, even if they were wearing life jackets, could drift away "and face many other difficulties." 
 
 He said rescue boats had not yet arrived, and there were no civilian vessels nearby. 
 
 The Associated Press contributed to this report. ||||| JINDO, South Korea — Of all the images from the loss of a ferry in the cold waters off the southwest coast of South Korea last week, perhaps none have angered South Koreans more than those of the captain and his key crew members awkwardly and quickly fleeing their half-submerged vessel to the safety of a rescue boat, even as hundreds of their passengers remained trapped inside. 
 
 The captain, Lee Jun-seok, 69, has yet to explain publicly why he abandoned the ship with people aboard — an apparent violation of maritime protocol, if not the law — as it sunk beneath the waves. 
 
 But a portrait of the ship’s last voyage is emerging from crew members, survivors and a transcript of the vessel’s final 40 minutes of communications with emergency dispatchers on shore. It is a scene of rapidly building chaos in which the captain and his crew faced a series of tough choices, questionable decisions and mechanical failures — including the apparent loss of the onboard communications system. Those factors may have all contributed to the ship’s sinking and the death of at least scores, and more likely hundreds, of people. 
 
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 “The Coast Guard will arrive in 15 minutes; please tell your passengers to wear life jackets,” emergency dispatchers told the ferry about half an hour after it radioed for help. 
 
 “Now we have lost our ability to broadcast our messages,” the ship responded. Crew members, using the ferry’s intercom, had previously instructed passengers to stay where they were, thinking it would be safer. 
 
 “Even if you can’t use your speaker, do your best to go out and ensure that your passengers wear life jackets or thick clothes,” emergency dispatchers said. 
 
 “If our passengers evacuate, will they be immediately rescued?” the ship responded. 
 
 “Let them float even with life rings. Hurry!” the dispatchers responded. A minute later, they added: “We don’t know the situation there. So the captain should make a final decision, and he should hurry to decide whether to evacuate them.” 
 
 A communications officer, in a separate part of the ferry, said he never received instructions from the bridge to tell passengers to abandon ship. One crew member on the bridge said he heard the captain give the order to evacuate, but that he did not hear the message broadcast to the passengers. Survivors have not reported hearing it. 
 
 When the ferry, the Sewol, began its overnight journey at 9 p.m. last Tuesday, embarking from a pier in Incheon, west of Seoul, and heading toward the southern resort island of Jeju, its voyage seemed like so many others the ship had taken. The 460-foot-long, five-story ferry plied this 264-mile route twice a week, along a busy shipping lane down the west coast of South Korea. 
 
 It had 443 passengers on board — 60 percent of its capacity. Most of them were second-year high school students on what was supposed to be the last school trip before they entered a pressure-cooker year of cramming for college entrance exams. The ship also carried a full load of cargo, including 124 cars, 56 trucks and 105 shipping containers. 
 
 Some of the students gathered on the deck watching fireworks bursting in the night sky. Below deck, others strolled in small groups or gathered in entertainment rooms to sing karaoke or play video games. 
 
 Up in the pilothouse, on the ship’s top deck, the crew worked in four shifts. This ship left late because of fog, and Oh Yong-seok, 58, a helmsman, was on a second shift, taking the wheel under the guidance of a shipmate at 11 p.m. The water was calm, the night quiet, Mr. Oh recalled in a series of interviews in the past week. The captain stopped by the bridge from time to time to check on matters. 
 
 As Mr. Oh handed over the controls to the third shift, Mr. Oh suggested that crew members double-check the straps tying down the vehicles and cargo in the hold, he recalled. On his round, he told them that he had noticed that several had come loose and he tightened them. Otherwise, he said, there were no issues. With that, he retired to his berth and fell into a deep sleep. 
 
 The last shift began at 7:30 a.m., under the watch of Park Han-gyeol, 26, the youngest of the ship’s mates. She had been with the company only six months. On this trip, her shift coincided with the passage of the ship through the most challenging section of the voyage: a waterway known for its rapid and unpredictable currents and frequent ship accidents. 
 
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 “When the current hits the ship’s side, it can throw the ship off course,” Mr. Oh said. “It’s not easy to steer there.” 
 
 Ms. Park was navigating this notorious waterway for the first time, giving instructions to a helmsman at the wheel, according to prosecutors who have raised the question of how qualified she was for the difficult passage. 
 
 On Monday, prosecutors detained the Sewol’s three remaining ship mates and its chief engineer for questioning. 
 
 Investigators say the Sewol appeared to make a sharp turn to the left around the time it began to tilt, and they were looking into whether unsecured cargo may have shifted, contributing to the accident. The helmsman on duty, Jo Jun-gi, later told reporters that “I made a mistake of my own, but the ship turned much more than usual.” A prosecutor said investigators were also looking into “discrepancies” between Ms. Park’s and Mr. Jo’s versions of what happened. 
 
 At 8:48 a.m., Mr. Oh said, he was jolted awake as his body was thrown against the port side wall of his quarters. The vessel had begun to list. 
 
 He lurched from his room barefoot and scrambled along the corridor of the ship toward the bridge. The first person he saw was Mr. Lee, the ship’s captain. 
 
 Mr. Lee, who had been in his room, had just clambered out of his cabin and, with the ship slowly turning onto its side, was now holding onto the doorway of the pilothouse, trying to pull himself inside and get control of the ship. Mr. Oh pushed the captain up and into the room and followed as well. 
 
 Soon, all of the ship’s mates and helmsmen had gathered there. Mr. Lee, clutching onto a pillar near the map table at the center of the bridge, began barking orders. 
 
 “The ship was already listing so heavily everyone was hanging onto whatever they could grab,” Mr. Oh recalled. “It was clear we were in a really bad situation.” 
 
 That situation would in short order get even worse. 
 
 Investigators trying to reconstruct events have been weighing a range of possible causes, including pilot error; an unexpected current; failure in the ship’s ballast; loose or unbalanced cargo; a recent addition of more cabins on the upper deck of the 20-year-old ferry that may have impaired its ability to recover balance; and loosely abided safety regulations. 
 
 At 8:55 a.m., with the ship tilting and unable to move, someone on the bridge asked the local maritime authorities to “please come quickly,” according to the transcript of the ship-to-shore radio communications. 
 
 Continue reading the main story NORTH KOREA Seoul Incheon SOUTH KOREA Yellow Sea Ferry route JINDO Approximate site of ferry sinking JEJU 50 MILES 
 
 Mr. Lee ordered the crew to right the ship. But Ms. Park said the ballast motor was not working, Mr. Oh recalled. 
 
 At 9:05 a.m., the radio on shore crackled with another urgent message from the Sewol: “What’s going on with the Coast Guard?” A government emergency dispatcher began asking ships in the area to go to the Sewol’s aid. 
 
 Two levels below, Kang Hae-seong, one of the ship’s communications officers, was in the broadcasting room and trying to figure out what to do. With the ship listing about 30 degrees and cutlery falling off the shelves, he made an announcement on the public address system urging the passengers to stay where they were and not to move hastily. 
 
 “I didn’t have time to look at the manual but I thought I should calm people down first,” he recalled in an interview. 
 
 Mr. Lee said on Friday that he did not order an immediate evacuation because he feared the passengers would be endangered by the strong currents and the cold water. Mr. Oh said Mr. Lee first tried to get the ship’s life rafts deployed. His crew tried but could not make it to the lifeboats. 
 
 By 9:18 a.m., the Sewol reported that it was listing at an angle of more than 50 degrees. “Impossible to evacuate,” someone on the Sewol’s bridge told emergency dispatchers by radio. 
 
 Down below, Mr. Kang contacted the Coast Guard using his cellphone and then continued to tell people on the public address system to remain where they were “a little while longer” because the rescue boats were coming. 
 
 At 9:23 a.m., the bridge sent another distress call: “We are about to sink.” 
 
 As the ship continued to list and filled with water, Mr. Kang and his colleagues stacked chairs to enable some passengers to climb to the fourth floor. 
 
 “It was chaotic because everyone was just busy saving themselves and many people weren’t pulling up the people below them,” Mr. Kang recalled. 
 
 Mr. Oh said he heard Mr. Lee, before leaving the bridge, give the order to evacuate, but Mr. Oh did not hear it broadcast. Mr. Kang, the communications officer, said he never received the order. A senior prosecutor said investigators were still trying to figure out whether it ever reached the passengers. 
 
 At 9:38 a.m., in the ship’s last communication with emergency dispatchers, the bridge reported that the vessel was listing at 60 degrees. “Those who can evacuate through the port side are trying it,” a voice said over the radio. 
 
 All the crew members began to flee the bridge. More than two-thirds of the 29-member crew, including the entire navigation team, survived. Only about a third of the passengers — 174 — got out alive. By Monday, 61 people had been confirmed dead and 241 were still missing. 
 
 Mr. Oh saw Mr. Lee slide down the floor of the wheelhouse and crash through a door in the port-side wall. The helmsman said it was not clear whether the captain was evacuating or had just lost his grip of the pole and fell. 
 
 He did not see Mr. Lee again until an image of him was broadcast on television: The captain was in handcuffs, charged with accidental homicide. He was also charged with abandoning his passengers in a time of crisis, a crime punishable by up to life in prison. ||||| Are you there and safe? Show us what's happening. 
 
 Jindo, South Korea (CNN) -- Divers spent a grim day bringing body after body out of the sunken ferry Sewol. 
 
 They are lifted onto a dock -- slowly, gently -- and then shrouded with a blanket. 
 
 Some of the police officers standing guard wipe away tears as the bodies are carried past. 
 
 At least 108 people have died and 194 others remain missing. Many of them are students and teachers on a field trip from a high school near Seoul, the South Korean coast guard said Tuesday. 
 
 Although 174 people were rescued soon after the vessel sank Wednesday, no survivors have been found since. 
 
 "The conditions are so bad, my heart aches. We're going in thinking there may be survivors. When we have to come back with nothing, we can't even face the families," said Bard Yoon, a rescue diver. 
 
 Speaking for the families and much of her country, South Korean President Park Geun-hye likened the actions of the captain and some crew members of the Sewol to murder, as police made more four arrests. 
 
 The captain of the South Korean ship, Lee Joon-seok, is already facing a series of criminal charges for his role in the sinking. 
 
 "The actions of the captain and some of the crew are absolutely unacceptable, unforgivable actions that are akin to murder," Park said Monday in comments released by her office. She said she and other South Koreans were filled with "rage and horror." 
 
 The latest arrests of crew members bring the total number detained to seven as authorities investigate what went wrong on the ship as it sailed toward a popular holiday island. 
 
 Chonghaejin Marine, which operated the ferry, has posted an apology on its website. 
 
 "We pray for the Sewol victims who lost their precious lives due to the accident. We prostrate ourselves before the victims' families and beg for forgiveness. 
 
 "We apologize to all the people who are grieving for the loss of their loved ones. Also, we apologize to the people who had injuries, major or minor, due to this accident. We wish them a speedy recovery," read the statement. It was unclear when exactly it was posted. 
 
 "We will try our best to rescue the missing people quickly and we pray with all our hearts that there will be survivors. 
 
 "Once again, we beg for forgiveness from the victims' families and pray for the dead." 
 
 Dramatic dialogue 
 
 President Park's strong words came after more details emerged over the weekend about the chaos and confusion aboard the doomed ferry as the disaster unfolded in the cold waters of the Yellow Sea off South Korea's southwest coast. 
 
 A radio transcript released by authorities suggested that passengers on the ship couldn't reach lifeboats to escape because the ship tilted so quickly that it left many of them unable to move. 
 
 "Please notify the coast guard. Our ship is in danger. The ship is rolling right now," a crew member on the ship first tells authorities in a fraught conversation that took place as the Sewol ferry was foundering. 
 
 An unidentified crew member on the Sewol talked to two different Vessel Traffic Service centers as the ship sank Wednesday morning, the transcript revealed. 
 
 When one of the centers advises getting people into life vests, the crew member replies that it's "hard for people to move." 
 
 After the conversation switches to the other center, the crew member says the ship has leaned so far that passengers are unable to move. 
 
 "Are the passengers able to escape?" the center asks. 
 
 "The ship listed too much, so it is impossible," the crew member replies. 
 
 The center also urged the captain to take charge of the crisis. 
 
 "The captain should make (the) decision to make people escape," it told the ferry, noting that he had a better understanding of the situation. 
 
 Families protest over rescue operation 
 
 Captain defends actions 
 
 Capt. Lee has defended his order to delay the evacuation of the ferry. 
 
 "It is a fairly fast current area, and the water temperature was cold," he said over the weekend, according to CNN affiliate YTN. 
 
 "I thought that abandoning the ship without discretion would make you drift off a fairly far distance and cause a lot of trouble. At the same time, the rescue ship did not come, and there were no fishing boats or supporting ships around to help at that time." 
 
 But the first mate of a boat that responded to the Sewol's emergency call disagreed. 
 
 "If the passengers had jumped into the water sooner, more people could have been rescued," Eun Dae-young told CNN affiliate YTN in a phone interview Monday. 
 
 The ferry captain has been charged with abandoning his boat, negligence, causing bodily injury, not seeking rescue from other ships and violating "seamen's law," South Korean media reported. 
 
 Prosecutor Lee Bong-chang gave more details about the accusations against the captain. 
 
 "Mr. Lee is charged with causing the Sewol ship to sink by failing to slow down while sailing the narrow route and making (a) turn excessively," the prosecutor told the semiofficial Yonhap news agency. 
 
 "Lee is also charged with failing to do the right thing to guide the passengers to escape and thereby leading to their death or injury." 
 
 If convicted, the captain faces from five years to life in prison. 
 
 The captain wasn't at the helm of the Sewol when it started to sink, the prosecutor said. A third mate was at the helm. 
 
 Authorities said Monday that four more crew members of the ferry have been detained, bringing the total number arrested to seven. 
 
 Two first helmsmen, one second helmsman and the chief engineer are now under arrest, said Yang Joong-jin, the chief prosecutor of the investigation. He said the four crew members could face indictment on several charges. 
 
 As well as the captain, two other crew members were arrested over the weekend. 
 
 Divers feel emotional strain 
 
 Dozens of divers have continued to plunge into the frigid, murky waters, still holding out hope that they might find somebody alive inside the sunken ship. 
 
 "There must be survivors, no matter what we must find the air pocket. That's why I have hope," Choung Dong-nam, the head of volunteer divers involved in the search, said Sunday. 
 
 But each hour reduces the chances of finding anyone alive, and the human cost of the disaster weighs on the divers. 
 
 "We cry everyday and search for the missing people," Choung said. "I cry whenever I think about it." 
 
 The task is made severely challenging by the poor visibility. 
 
 One meter down, they can see about 50 centimeters (about 1.6 feet) in front of them, Choung said. Below 10 meters, they can see only 20 centimeters (less than 8 inches) ahead. 
 
 The divers are using guidelines to navigate their way around 
 
 Where was the captain? 
 
 As the search goes on, the actions of the captain and crew remain under scrutiny. 
 
 The captain was not in the steering room when the accident took place, according to police and his own account. 
 
 He said he plotted the ship's course, and then went to his cabin briefly "to tend to something." It was then, the captain said, that the accident happened. 
 
 A crew member, described as the third mate and identified only as Park, appeared in handcuffs with Capt. Lee at the weekend. 
 
 The third mate said she did not make a sharp turn, but "the steering turned much more than usual." 
 
 The captain and the third mate both apologized to the bereaved families. 
 
 Park is facing charges including negligence and causing injuries leading to deaths, authorities said. A technician with the surname Cho is also facing the same charges, they said. 
 
 The captain was one those rescued soon after the Sewol began to sink, violating an "internationally recognized rule that a captain must stay on the vessel," maritime law attorney Jack Hickey said. 
 
 "Pretty much every law, rule, regulation and standard throughout the world says that yes, the captain must stay with the ship until all personnel are safely off of the ship, certainly passengers." 
 
 In recent maritime disasters, captains didn't hang around 
 
 Students remember vice principal who took own life 
 
 Murky waters cloud the horror facing rescue divers 
 
 CNN's Kyung Lah and Will Ripley reported from Jindo; CNN's Jethro Mullen reported and wrote from Hong Kong. CNN's Ralph Ellis, Greg Botelho, Frances Cha, Tim Schwarz, Steven Jiang and Judy Kwon; and journalists Stella Kim and Jung-eun Kim contributed to this report.
– At least 87 people have died in South Korea's ferry disaster, leaving 215 still missing; the tragedy has prompted South Korean president to call the actions of the captain and some of the crew "akin to murder," CNN reports. The crew "told the passengers to stay put, but they themselves became the first to escape, after deserting the passengers," Park said. "Legally and ethically, this is an unimaginable act." Four more crew members have been detained in the incident, Fox News reports. Meanwhile, a transcript is revealing a more complete story of the tragedy: Half an hour after the ship sent out a distress call, emergency personnel radioed that the Coast Guard would be on the scene "in 15 minutes" and the crew should ensure passengers were wearing life jackets, the New York Times reports. "If our passengers evacuate, will they be immediately rescued?" the ship replied. "Let them float even with life rings. Hurry!" dispatchers said. But they added that the "final decision" on evacuation was the captain's. It remains unclear what caused the disaster, but the final steering shift went to a 26-year-old shipmate who'd never taken on the dangerous path before. Park Han-gyeol had only been with the company for six months. Another potential problem: Some of the cargo had apparently come loose, said a helmsman. That helmsman, Oh Yong-seok, 58, headed to the pilothouse after being awakened at 8:48am when he was thrown into a wall by the tilting ship. "The ship was already listing so heavily everyone was hanging onto whatever they could grab," he said. As for the question of evacuation, a communications officer says he didn't receive orders to tell passengers to leave; a crew member says the order was given, but he never heard it broadcast to those on board, the Times reports. One announcement, however, told passengers to stay in place. "I didn’t have time to look at the manual but I thought I should calm people down first," he said. Click for more on the back-and-forth between dispatchers and the ferry's crew.