Kerala - Kochi   

Navy, Coast Guard continue rescue operations

By Our Staff Reporter

KOCHI, DEC. 29. The personnel of the Indian Navy and Coast Guard continued their rescue operations for the third day today not only along the coast of Kerala but also in the islands of Sri Lanka and Maldives.

In Sri Lanka

Two vessels of the Navy — INS Sharda, an offshore patrol vessel (OPV), and INS Sutlej, a survey ship — anchored off Galle, continued to provide medical and food supplies to Sri Lanka. The Naval officers said that the ships could not go alongside Galle as the port had been badly damaged in the tsunamic attack.

The two Chetaks on board these vessels conducted search-and-rescue (SAR) along the Lankan coast and dropped food packets and relief supplies. Another survey vessel, INS Jamuna, is being kept as standby at the Southern Naval Command's base here. This ship is loaded with medical and food material.

Meanwhile, the Coast Guard flew several sorties using two fixed-wing Dornier planes and two Chetak choppers. A Dornier was pressed into relief operation at Maldives. This was the first plane to land at Male after its runway got inundated in Sunday's tidal wave attack.

The Dornier conducted many sorties from Male to other tiny islands such as Kadhdaou and Hanimadu carrying medicines and food. It carried over a tonne of medicines and food to Kadhdaou, 139 nautical miles south of Male, and carried back several casualties to the island capital.

The plane will continue to transport relief supplies tomorrow, said the Coast Guard Commander, DIG M.S. Dangi. It will transport mini-generator sets to the isles around Male tomorrow, he said.

Another Dornier aircraft conducted search for four hours along the coast from Ponnani to Thiruvananthapuram today. No floating body or debris was found.

The Dornier could fly up to a low level of 200 ft at a speed of 80 nautical miles per hour. This, said Mr. Dangi, helped the fixed-wing plane survey the coastline with precision. Coast Guard's Dornier usually flies at a height of 400 to 500 ft. It flies normally at 300 nautical miles per hour.

The Coast Guard placed two of its vessels — CGS Durgabai Deshmukh, a fast patrol vessel, and CGS Sagar, an advanced OPV with a Chetak on board — out at sea monitoring the fallout of the tsunami attack.

Two Coast Guard helicopters flew low along the shoreline of Kerala today, conducting search and rescue at the affected areas between Thiruvananthapuram and Karunagapally.

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