The Indian Coast Guard on Wednesday said that nine days of search and rescue operation for the missing Dornier aircraft has not yielded any ‘positive’ result. Even the induction of Sagar Nidhi, the advanced research vessel owned by NIOT (National Institute of Ocean Technology) could not make any progress in the search operation and hence the ship is being withdrawn, said Satya Prakash Sharma, Inspector General, Coast Guard (East).
Addressing a media meet, Sharma said a vessel owned by the Reliance Group which has all modern facilities for underwater search is being brought to the coast off Karaikkal to beef up the search operations. He said the depth of the region which ranges fom 700 meters to 1000 meters has made the operation complex and difficult.
Sharma convened the press meet following anxiety expressed by the wives of the crew of the missing aircraft. Deepa lakshmi, wife of commandant Subhash Suresh, the co-pilot of the aircraft had tweeted on Tuesday for the intervention of the Prime Minister to intensify the search mission. But her close relations clarified later that her tweet was a result of news telecast by some of the Tamil news channels that the government may call off the operations in the backdrop of mounting costs. A total of 12 ships belonging to the Coast Guard and Indian Navy and a number of patrol vessels were working round-the-clock in search of the aircraft since last Tuesday.
Amruta Soni, wife of Manoj Kumar Soni, another commandant and navigator of the missing aircraft wanted the union government to seek international assistance. “I feel there is a shortage of technology available with us for an operation of this magnitude. So I feel we should try some kind of international assistance in locating the aircraft,” Amruta told reporters on Wednesday.
Two international flights MH 370 (Malaysian Air lines which was on its way to Beijing from Kula lumpur) and Air Asia flight QZ 8501 which was flying from Indonesia to Singapore were reported missing in march and December 2014. Search and rescue teams are yet to get any lead about these aircraft which carried 401 passengers between them. Both the aircraft are believed to have fallen in the Indian Ocean.