The arrival of three huge seaborne cranes at the site Friday added to relatives’ fears the focus of the mission would soon shift from search and rescue to salvage.
“What those cranes signify … is that this is no longer a search for survivors. It is a long term process of lifting the hull, and those cranes are going to turn this from a search and rescue mission to a recovery,” CNN correspondent Kyung Lah reported from Jindo.
The cranes will be used to help lift at least part of the ferry out of the water.
Salvage crews maneuvered the three 3,600 ton floating cranes into position. A further crane due to expected to arrive later Friday.
Offshore cranes wait near buoys that mark the location of the sunken ferry Sewol in the waters off the southern coast near Jindo, South Korea, on Friday, April 18. It is not yet known what caused the ship to sink Wednesday, and hundreds of passengers remain missing.
