Ehime Maru THE NAVY SAYS DIVERS in the search for missing people from the Ehime Maru face the obstacle of not knowing the condition of the ship after it sank.
divers face
uncertain journey
Navy officials say the inner
condition of the ship is
still unknownBy Gregg K. Kakesako
gkakesako@starbulletin.comPearl Harbor officials also said yesterday that key Navy leaders are expected to travel to Uwajima on Saturday to explain to relatives of the Ehime Maru's crew the planned salvage operations. They will also show an underwater video of what has been done so far.
Chief Warrant Officer George Primavera, who is planning and coordinating the diving part of the Navy's $40 million recovery operations, said yesterday, "The only barrier is the unknown condition inside of the ship."
Even after touring the Ehime Maru's sister ship -- the Kagawa Maru -- and after months of detailed planning and rehearsal, Primavera said questions of whether the passageways of the Ehime Maru are open, sealed or blocked by objects will not be answered until a diver is actually inside the ship.
Navy divers will not be able to make that determination until they climb into the 190-foot Japanese fisheries training vessel later this month. "Navy divers are trained to do this kind of salvage work, but every situation is different even though there may be similarities," said Primavera, who has been a professional Navy diver for the past 13 years.
"I am planning for every possible situation," said Primavera, who has participated in salvage operations following the crash of TWA Flight 800 and the space shuttle Challenger explosion. He said he has "jaws of life" cutting tools at his disposal if needed.
While the Navy prepares to try to lift the Ehime Maru from its 2,000-foot watery grave nine miles south of Diamond Head, Navy divers from Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit 1 have been training at Hickam Air Force Base since the beginning of August for the recovery part of the operation.
Capt. Greg Smith, Pacific Fleet spokesman, said the Navy is still on schedule with the three- to five-day operation to lift and move the Ehime Maru to shallower waters planned for later this month or early September.
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THE EHIME MARU SANK within minutes after it was struck by the surfacing nuclear attack submarine USS Greeneville on Feb. 9. The bodies of nine boys and men, including four students from Uwajima Fisheries High School in Ehime prefecture in Japan, aboard the vessel have never been found. The captain of the Greeneville, Cmdr. Scott Waddle, was stripped of his command but allowed to retire.The Navy has never undertaken the task of raising a vessel as heavy as the 830-ton Ehime Maru from such a depth.
Navy officials now believe that only five to seven of the missing are entombed in the vessel and that the others were lost at sea.
The Navy has assembled a team of 60 Navy divers and six Japanese civilian divers from the Ship Repair Facility in Yokosuka. These divers will be joined by 30 Japanese naval divers who will be arriving here Monday on the Japanese warship Chihaya.
Once the Ehime Maru has been moved to a shallow-water recovery site a mile south of the Honolulu Airport reef runway, the recovery operation will begin. Divers will work from sunrise to sunset, spending about 90 minutes underwater each time in specially rigged suits.
There will be from two to four divers in the water at a time.
The divers will wear fully encased Mark 21 helmets that will be rigged with underwater lights and a camera that will be recording video while the diver is in the water.
Each diver also will be wearing a special orange dry suit to protect him from coming in contact with fuel and lube oil that might leak from the Japanese vessel. On his back will be an emergency air bottle, but his main source of air will be supplied by an umbilical cord to the Crowley 450 barge, 115 feet above.
Cmdr. Rob Fink, commander of Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit 1, said the umbilical cord gives the diver "an unlimited supply of air" and the ability to communicate constantly with the surface.
The divers will ride to the bottom of the ocean on a small gray platform called "the stage."
They will only be allowed 90 minutes on the bottom and in the Ehime Maru before they must mount the stage and slowly be brought back to the surface, stopping at 40 feet to rest and decompress for three minutes and then rising another 30 feet to decompress for an additional seven minutes. Once on the surface, the divers must spend an additional 56 minutes in a recompression chamber, breathing pure oxygen for 51 minutes.Primavera said he does not expect physical problems at the shallow reef runway recovery site, where there is good visibility -- 40 to 50 feet.
"From 70 feet you can see the bottom of the ship," said Primavera, noting that the area is where the Navy holds many of its practice dives.
The Navy does not anticipate sending the divers immediately into the Ehime Maru after it has been transported to shallower waters, but will allow it to settle for 48 hours.
Primavera said he and another master diver will then make the first descent and trip onto the Ehime Maru. "I want to be comfortable that the vessel is safe before I send anyone else on board."
Besides recovering the remains of any of the missing, the Navy will try to retrieve personnel effects and unique items such as the Ehime Maru's helm, bell and anchor. The divers also will try to remove any remaining lube oil or diesel fuel that may still be on board.
Once the recovery mission has been completed, Japanese divers from the Japanese Self Defense Force ship Chihaya will then inspect the Ehime Maru and reef runway recovery site. The ship will be moved to another location 12 miles south of Barbers Point where it will be sunk in 6,000 feet of water.