Dakar, Senegal ? Backing earlier reports, military investigators identified overloading Wednesday as the key cause of Africa’s deadliest-ever ferry disaster describing how the ship tumbled over when passengers rushed to one side to take cover from a storm.

Built to hold 600 passengers and crew, the MS Joola was carrying at least 1,034 people when it capsized last week.

Authorities said at least 970 were killed but the figure could be higher because there could have been many more people on board. Children under 5 would have gone unticketed, and, apparently, uncounted.

Sixty-four people survived, and only one was a woman adding to indications of fierce struggles to escape the vessel.

The Joola, making a run from southern to northern Senegal, capsized in a fierce gale just before midnight Sept. 26.

Survivors described hours clinging to the upturned, orange boat hull until the first help, fishing vessels, arrived hours later.

The release of the report came a day after the resignation of the West African nation’s transport and armed forces minister.

Because it was low season for tourists, the armed forces report said, there were very few cars and little freight in the ferry’s hold weight which would have stabilized the ferry. Almost all the freight on board had been loaded on deck, investigators said.

Meanwhile, about 500 people were crowded on the top deck nearly as many as the entire ferry was meant to hold.

“When the ferry rode into a storm, the people on the top deck were suddenly confronted with strong rains and gales coming from starboard,” the report said. “To get under cover, they moved in mass toward port.”

That movement caused a final, fatal shift in the ferry’s already precarious center of balance, investigators concluded.

Divers’ film of the submerged wreck later showed lifeboats and other safety equipment were never released.