Japanese ship to HIROSHIMA, Japan >> The submarine rescue ship Chihaya was to leave for Hawaii yesterday to take part in salvaging the Japanese fisheries training ship Ehime Maru after colliding with a surfacing U.S. submarine.
help salvage
Ehime Maru
The Chihaya, a rescue ship,
will assist in retrieving effects
from the Ehime MaruKyodo News Service
The 5,450-ton Chihaya, which carries 130 Maritime Self-Defense Force personnel, was scheduled to set sail from the self-defense force base in Kure, Hiroshima prefecture, for a 10-day journey to the waters off Oahu where the Ehime Maru is lying on the sea floor.
In announcing the Chihaya mission earlier this week, Defense Agency Director General Gen Nakatani said the Chihaya crew will assist the U.S. Navy in searching and retrieving salvageable items from the sunken ship.
A salvage ship charted by the U.S. Navy is currently preparing to raise the 499-ton Ehime Maru from about 2,000 feet below the surface and move it to shallower waters for the search-and-salvage operation.
The Chihaya crew includes 30 self-defense force divers who will join U.S. Navy divers in searching for human remains and personal effects inside the Ehime Maru.
Nine of the 35 Japanese crew members are missing and presumed dead after the Ehime Maru was rammed by the U.S. nuclear-powered submarine Greeneville about nine miles off Diamond Head on Feb. 9, while the sub was conducting a rapid-surfacing exercise for a group of civilian visitors.
After the Ehime Maru is moved to shallower waters, the Chihaya would use a remote-controlled submersible to comb the vicinity of the sea floor to look for salvageable effects that had been thrown overboard.
The submersible, which has four TV cameras to guide the search operation, is capable of lifting a 220-pound weight.