Anguished parents watch as disaster ferry is raised up
SOUTH KOREA: A ferry that sank three years ago causing the deaths of hundreds of schoolchildren has been raised from the sea bed in the latest chapter of a wrenching South Korean national drama.
The muddy and corroded hull of the 6825-ton Sewol appeared above the surface yesterday morning between two enormous salvage vessels. Relatives of the children who died, nine of whom have never been found, wept as they watched from a nearby ship.
‘‘We can’t help but feel stunned seeing the ship being raised,’’ said Lee Kum-hee, whose daughter Cho Eun-hwa, is one of the missing children. ‘‘My Eun-hwa has been in that dirty place. It’s been heartbreaking, how cold she’s been there. We just want one thing: for the ship to be pulled up so that we can take our children home.’’
The Sewol sank in April 2014 with the loss of 304 lives. Investigations revealed that it was carrying cargo three times greater than its maximum capacity. It appears to have sunk because shipping containers came loose and lurched to one side, causing it to list and sink after an unusually sharp turn.
Most of the crew escaped but the children died having followed instructions to stay in their cabins. Crew members who stayed behind to help died with them.
The ship sank too quickly for many of them to escape, but slowly enough that they were able to telephone their families while trapped inside. Lee Jun-seok, the captain, who was captured on video as he abandoned his ship in his underwear, was sentenced to life in prison for wilful negligence. Terms ranging from two to 12 years were handed down to 14 other crew members.
Of the 304 people who died on the ferry, 250 were pupils from a single secondary school. Public fury about the disaster focused on President Park Geunhye, who was slow to make a public statement and to appear at the scene.
She never recovered from the impression of coldness and inattention that was communicated by her handling of the tragedy: this month, after a separate corruption scandal, she was dismissed from office.
The salvage operation, one of the biggest and most difficult ever carried out, involved 33 metal beams being placed under the ship, which lay on the seabed 44m below the surface. It was then lifted to the surface by 66 hydraulic jacks. Now the ship, mounted on a semisubmersible craft, will be transported to a nearby port, a journey that will take a fortnight.
The recovery has been complicated by the fact that, unlike most underwater salvage operations, the Sewol was not to be broken into pieces for fear of damaging or dispersing human remains still inside. The salvage team did have to cut off the ramp, however, which was open and hampering the operation.
‘‘We are scared that our children may not be there, but we are holding on to the tiniest strand of hope that we will find them,’’ Ms Lee said. ‘‘That sense of fear is unimaginable.’’
As people all over South Korea watched the recovery operation live on television, social media users shared photographs of a cloud that resembled the yellow ribbon symbol used to commemorate those who died. — The Times