OPERATION CONTINUES IN SEA NEAR SOCHI TO RAISE AIRLINER RECORDERS
ITAR-TASS, Russia
May 17 2006
SOCHI, May 17 (Itar-Tass) – The third stage of the search operation is
under way at the A-320 airliner crash site in the Black Sea near Sochi.
According to the operational headquarters, the third, final, stage
of the operation has been continuing day and night in the area where
the Armenian airbus crashed. Groups of searchers are on duty there
for eight hours and replace each other.
The strong side wind that impeded the operation subsided at about
midnight to Wednesday.
The deep-water robot device sank to the seabed during the period from
01:00 till 06:00 on Wednesday to search for the airliner recorders.
Silt on the bottom complicates the work. The video camera and the
searchlights get dirty, and the team has to raise the robot to clean
them. Its sinking takes 40 minutes, and it takes the same time to
raise it, a source in the operational headquarters told Itar-Tass.
The search groups had a break in the work for some time on Wednesday
morning. If the weather does not worsen, the search will continue.
The rescue vessel Kapitan Beklemishev delivered the RT-1000 robot
from Novorossiisk to Sochi on Monday.
The robot did not participate in such operations before. It raised
only geological samples weighing up to 20 kilogrammes and did not
work at such depths.
The device is capable to lift fragments of the plane weighing up
to 12 kilogrammes and the two flight recorders, each weighing seven
kilogrammes, said the Russian sea and river transport department’s
head Alexander Davydenko.
The RT-1000 is a system consisting of control and lifting equipment
and the apparatus itself with photo and video equipment and a hydraulic
manipulator operating in all directions.
According to reports, the flight recorders are at the depth of 496
metres. The distance between them is about five metres.
The Armavia airline A-320 airbus fell into the sea on May 3 when
approaching Sochi’s airport in an attempt to land. The crash killed
113 people.
The operation to raise the fight recorders resumed late on Tuesday
night when the wind subsided.
The vessel Navigator with the robot aboard remained at the area on
Wednesday morning, the operational headquarters said.
On Tuesday, the strong side wind blew off the Navigator from the site
and did not allow resuming the work on the bottom.
The operation to find and raise the recorders may last three days.