THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, July 20, 1996 TAG: 9607200253
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A8 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CHARLENE CASON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 68 lines
Navy divers left Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base on Friday, bound for the site of Wednesday's crash of a TWA jetliner off the Long Island, N.Y., coast.
The divers and communications specialists took a recompression chamber and a 24-foot, rigid-hull inflatable boat with them on Navy trucks about 2 p.m. Friday, joining other military diving experts dispatched to waters at the site where 230 passengers and crew members were killed in a fiery explosion.
Lt. Cmdr. Gordon Hume, a Navy spokesman at the scene, said the service had ``been called in to coordinate the underwater search for the black boxes and flight-data instruments.
``That is our primary mission,'' Hume said.
The divers were called in because they have specialized training and equipment for deep-water searches. Wreckage and the bodies of many of the victims are believed to be resting on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, at an estimated depth of 120 feet.
Coast Guard spokesman Chief Warrant Officer Dean Jones said, ``We have expertise in surface search-and-recovery, but the Navy has expertise in below-the-surface search-and-recovery.''
The National Transportation Safety Board requested that an advance diving and salvage team, headed by Capt. Raymond McCord from Naval Sea Systems in Washington, study the scene to determine which divers and equipment, if any, were needed off Moriches Bay, on Long Island's south-central coast.
Originally, 60 divers and explosive ordnance and communications specialists were on standby at Little Creek, the Army's Fort Story in Virginia Beach, and other bases in New Jersey and South Carolina.
But just 20 service members were sent Thursday in Phase One of the salvage effort.
That number includes four divers from Mobile Diving and Salvage Detachment Unit 2, two specialists from Explosive Ordnance Disposal Mobile Unit 2, and two communications specialists from commander, Explosive Ordnance Disposal Group 2 - all based at Little Creek.
Other divers were sent from Earle Naval Weapons Station in Colts Neck, N.J., and the Charleston Naval Base.
Navy search gear, including a pinger locator system, remote operator vehicle and a side-scanner sonar system, were loaded Friday onto the Pirouette, a civilian charter vessel, in Tom's River, N.J.
Meanwhile, crews of a Portsmouth-based Coast Guard cutter and two C-130 Hercules planes from the Elizabeth City Coast Guard Air Station continued their search of the crash site, a mission they had begun almost immediately after the Wednesday night crash.
The 270-foot cutter Harriet Lane - part of the Coast Guard's 5th District, headquartered in Portsmouth - has been the on-site coordinating vessel since search-and-rescue efforts began.
Its 140-member crew has worked around the clock to recover the bodies of victims.
``They have not been relieved,'' Jones said. ``This is pretty much an all-hands effort. The small boat crews are working shifts, however - generally 24 hours, then time off.''
Search-and-recovery operations Friday centered on an area about 16 miles south of Moriches Inlet, he said. Because of tide drift, wreckage and the bodies of victims were being recovered more than six miles from the crash site.
Thirty-six hours after the plane exploded, the Coast Guard had enlarged its search area from 240 to 300 square miles, Jones said.
While fog and rain slowed down search-and-recovery efforts somewhat Friday, the Coast Guard - using more than 500 men and women - would ``continue its efforts, at the same level of energy, until all the wreckage is recovered,'' Jones said.
KEYWORDS: TWA FLIGHT 800 ACCIDENT PLANE by CNB