Earlier, Navy Spokesman Comm. Kosala Warnakulasuriya said that the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) officials investigating the plane crash, have requested Sri Lanka Navy to salvage the underwater wreckage of the Lionair flight and it has been agreed to begin the salvage operation yesterday – 31 October.
Comm. Kosala Warnakulasuriya speaking to Asian Tribune said that the salvage operation has been postponed for ‘another day’ . He said at present the sea is very rough and diving operation cannot be done if the sea condition remains the same.
Asked when the Sri Lanka Navy will commence the salvage operation, Comm. Kosala Warnakulasuriya said that it all depends now again on the weather and also on an appropriate date for the Terrorist Investigation Division who has to be present when the operation commence along with Magistrate of Mannar.
The Lionair 602 which took off with 48 passengers, six crew members and two Ukranian pilots, from the Palali airport to Ratmalana, on September 29, 1998, went missing from the radar screen after 10 minutes.
Until April this year, when the TID officers apprehended a LTTE suspect who confessed to shooting down the airplane with a shoulder held missile, the disappearance of the plane remained a mystery.
Sivasubramaniam Thillaraj of the LTTE, confessed that an LTTE leader had ordered the shooting down, even though they were aware that it was carrying Tamil civilian passengers to Colombo.
The suspect in custody had identified the person who ordered the aircraft shooting down as one Gadafi, a close associate of LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran. Gadafi was killed during the final phase of fighting on the Vanni east front in early 2009.
But according to a report from the University Teachers’ for Human Rights, it was a boy of 17 years who shot down the plane!” The people of the area have identified him as ‘Arul’ who is in charge of the Sea Tiger base at Nachchikudah, as having executed the order to bring down the aircraft.
In the meantime, according University Teachers’ for Human Rights Information Bulletin No. 19 of 16th October 1998, “Jaffna daily 'Uthayan' quoting officials in the Mannar Kachcheri said that fishermen from Pesalai who were in the area had reported seeing an aircraft fall into the sea near of Iranativu, which is 15 miles north of Mannar Island.
It further said that at the request of the parents of two passengers from Vankalai, their parish priest Fr.Thevasahayampillai, was going to the LTTE controlled area to find out what had happened. The two passengers were young women, one of whom was studying in the University of Jaffna.
The following day (Friday 2nd October) the result of Fr.Thevasahayampillai’s visit appeared in the Uthayan, and he was interviewed over BBC(Tamil Service) late in the evening. He had talked to fisherfolk and a government official. Two of them had seen the aircraft on fire, nose-diving into the sea near Iranativu, and had at first run, thinking it was a bomber.
In all six bodies had been recovered in a state of decay around Valappadu north-east of Iranativu, and had been buried. They also handed over to the priest the identity card of Coomarasamy Ragunathan, a passenger resident in Negombo.
Further reports said that one body was washed ashore in Jaffna and another 20 or so near Kalmunai Point, a promontory along the coast just before Jaffna lagoon and the peninsula. It was further said that all the bodies reaching the mainland shore were buried with the knowledge of the LTTE.
The Ukranian crew of the shot down Lionair consisted of Lysaivanov Siarhei (co-pilot), Kozlov Sergei (navigator) and Anapryienka Siarhei (flight engineer). The two Lion Air cabin crew were Dharshini Gunasekera (chief stewardess) and Chrishan Nelson (steward) and Vijitha (labourer).
Thursday 1 November 2012 http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/11/01/salvaging-operation-lionair-flight-wreck-yet-begin
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