Some parts of debris of the ship-hit fishing boat Don-1 have been recovered from the high seas off Alappuzha coast by a team of clearance divers sent in by the Indian Navy.
The Navy team performed a hasty search using a side-scan sonar system. Using the debris, the officials would conduct a detailed investigation to analyse the impact of the collision.
“When a boat sinks, it leaves a path of debris (objects from within the ship or objects breaking off). Depending on how deep the vessel sinks, this debris can be scattered over a large distance. Hence, the search operations are risky and time- consuming,” Navy sources said.
The debris was lying at a depth of about 50 metres near the site of the accident.At that depth, normal divers cannot sustain the pressure, as oxygen toxicity occurs as a result of the increased pressure and this can result in seizures (the pressure increases with depth at a rate of one atmosphere per 10 metres), the Nave sources added. “The weight of the water above a diver exerts pressure on his body. The deeper a diver descends, the more the water he has above him, and the more the pressure it exerts on his body.”
On Saturday, divers in special decompression chambers carried out the search operation.
The special decompression chamber is a pressure vessel, which helps reduce the pressure.
Naval officials deployed INS Sarvekshak fitted with a side scan sonar capable of detecting underwater objects.
A team of well-equipped navy team reached the Neendakara coast by around 4 pm and carried out the search till sunset.
Two fishermen had been killed in a collision and three still “missing”,
The divers found the boat’s cabin damaged and fuel still leaking. However, the hull was relatively intact.
Don-1 was also enveloped by a maze of fishing nets making it hazardous for the divers to attempt entering the boat in fading light. The diving effort to locate the bodies of the fishermen inside the boat will continue on Sunday.
Earlier, the Navy divers familiarised themselves with the layout of the boat by visiting a similar fishing boat close by. INS Kabra had sailed out from Kochi with clearance divers and special equipment to the site of the accident and INS Sarvekshak commanded by Captain Adhir Arora detected the location of the vessel.