Ferry emerges
Operation comes three years after country’s worst-ever maritime disaster
S. Korea raises sunken ferry ‘Sewol’ three years after it sank with a loss of more than 300 lives.
DONGGEOCHADO: South Korea’s sunken Sewol ferry emerged from the waters, 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 yesterday showed one side of the 6,825-tonne vessel, its white structure rusted and filthy, above the waves between two giant salvage barges.
The complex operation 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 Keun-hui, 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.”
Dozens of salvage operators walked over the hull after it came to the surface, television pictures showed.
About 450 workers are involved in the Herculean efforts to lift the ship, which now weighs between 8,000-8,500 tonnes including the silt piled up inside.
Once the ferry is brought up sufficiently high, it 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 CheolJo, the ministry official in charge of the operation.
Investigations into the disaster, in which 304 people died, concluded it was largely man-made – the cumulative result of an illegal redesign, an overloaded cargo bay, inexperienced crew and a questionable relationship between the ship operators and state regulators.
Even though the vessel took around three hours to sink, many of those on board never heard any evacuation order, while the crew were among the first to escape to safety. — AFP