S. Korea raises sunken Sewol ferry after 3 years

Relatives watch complex operation on site

South Korea’s sunken Sewol ferry emerged from the waters Thursday, nearly three years after it went down with the loss of more than 300 lives and dealt a crushing blow to now- ousted president Park Geun- hye.

Television pictures showed one side of the 145- metre- long vessel, its white structure rusted and filthy, above the waves between two giant salvage barges.

The complex operation – one of the largest raising of the entire ship ever attempted – comes as the third anniversary approaches of one of the country’s worst- ever maritime disasters.

Almost all the dead were schoolchildren and it is thought that nine bodies still unaccounted for may be trapped inside the sunken ship. Raising the ferry intact has been a key demand of the families of the victims.

Several relatives watched the much- anticipated operation unfolding from a boat near the site.

“To see the Sewol again, I can’t describe how I’m feeling right now,” said Huh Hong- hwan, whose 16- year- old daughter was killed in the accident. Her body has not been found.

Huh and his wife have for years maintained a bitter, defiant vigil in Jindo along with a handful of other relatives of missing victims. “It took so long,” Huh said. Another parent, Lee KeunHui, tearfully called for public support and prayers to help move the ship onshore intact and a full inquiry into the sinking “so a tragedy like this would never ever happen again”.

“It breaks my heart to see the ship coming up,” she said. “My daughter has been trapped in such a dirty, dark place for all these years.”

Other bereaved family members have kept watching at a camp on a hilltop on Donggeochado – the nearest island to the site, just 1.5 kilometers away.

About 450 workers are in- volved in the painstaking efforts to lift the ship, which has a displacement of 6,825 tons but is now estimated to weigh between 8,000- 8,500 tons including the silt piled up inside.

Dozens of salvage operators walked over the hull after it came to the surface, television pictures showed.

By late afternoon the top of the wreck was 8.5 meters above the waterline, Seoul’s maritime ministry said in a statement.

Once it is raised to 13 meters, the ferry will be moved onto a semi- submersible ship, which will carry it to the port of Mokpo. “We believe that it will take about 12 to 13 days to lift the ship and move it to Mokpo,” said Lee Cheol- Jo, the official in charge of the operation.

The vessel was lying more than 40 meters below the waves off southwestern South Korea and the operation, originally scheduled for last year, had been pushed back several times because of adverse weather.