Four college students - half of the passengers on a yacht on Taihu Lake, Jiangsu province, on Wednesday - were killed after the vessel carrying them hit a cable connecting two cargo ships.

Wu Jiayi, a 22-year-old tour guide and student at the East China University of Political Science and Law, and Yang Huizheng, a freshman at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, were confirmed dead on Thursday. The bodies of two other students, Xu Haotian and Xu Zhexing, were dragged from the water on Thursday.

The Suzhou maritime safety administration said the cable that the yacht hit was being used by one cargo ship to tug another that was without power. The yacht was driven between the two vehicles at about 1 pm on Wednesday.

The cable cut off the yacht's roof, causing it to fall onto the passengers onboard, who, besides the tour guide and captain, included six freshmen from Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

"The ceiling suddenly fell and something smashed my head," a victim with the surname Peng told Suzhou television news. "It really hurt. All that I knew when I opened my eyes again was that all of my classmates had fallen down in front of me."

Two students sitting in the back row of a group of seats aboard the yacht were thrown into the lake.

Their bodies were found on Thursday, one at 11:20 am and the other at 1:10 pm. By that time, searches for victims had been going on for more than 20 hours in a 10-square-kilometer area near the accident site.

Four college students - half of the passengers on a yacht on Taihu Lake, Jiangsu province, on Wednesday - were killed after the vessel carrying them hit a cable. [Photo/CFP]