No Holy Week break for demolition team of grounded US minesweeper

From InterAksyon (Mar 24): No Holy Week break for demolition team of grounded US minesweeper

The salvage team of the Jascon-25 will work throughout the Holy Week as it races to finish, by mid-April, the job of dismantling the USS Guardian (MCM5), the US Navy minesweeper grounded since January at the Tubbataha Reef in the Sulu Sea in Palawan.

Commodore Enrico Efren Evangelista, commander of the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) Palawan district, said the April 15 timeframe includes a cleanup.

The final cutting of the boat’s parts is expected to be finished on March 26; and this will be followed by the lifting of the parts.

The Coast Guard spokesman, Commander Armand Balilo, said the salvage team will start the cutting on Tuesday.

“It seems they will not go for a Holy Week break. They do not want any more delays except if bad weather comes again. We need six more consecutive days without weather disturbance to completely finish the cutting and then followed by hauling,” he said.

The salvage team, he said, is very precise in their moves so as not to cause further damage to the reef, one of the world’s richest marine biodiversity sites and listed a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

Nearly 5,000 square meters of the reef were damaged when the minesweeper hit it. Further attempts to extricate the boat as is failed, and only resulted in making it plow further inward into the reef, owing to strong waves.

“Actually, the salvage operation is very satisfactory. They’re so precise and very orderly. Debris floating on the water is immediately removed and placed inside a container van. They have a high consideration for safety of the team and prevention of further damage to the reef,” he said.

Last week, militant groups slammed an invitation by the US government for Philippine authorities to participate in an investigation they are making into why the warship landed on Tubbataha. Officers initially claimed they strayed into the reef because they were misled by faulty digital navigation equipment.

The militant groups said it’s the Philippine government that should investigate the illegal entry of the warship on prohibited maritime territory and the fact that the area is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The captain and crew of the warship defied warnings not to enter the reef that led to its grounding on January 17. The US Navy whisked its personnel to Sasebo, Japan, apparently to avoid arrest for violating maritime laws and legal responsibility in Philippine [article incomplete]

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/57855/no-holy-week-break-for-demolition-team-of-grounded-us-minesweeper