By Kim Bo-eun
Expectations are growing that the salvaging of the ferry Sewol will be able to clarify the cause of its sinking, which killed over 300 passengers on April 16, 2014.
If the ferry is successfully lifted, it will be taken to nearby Mokpo Port for inspection by a newly created inspection committee.
Earlier investigations by the prosecution concluded that the sinking occurred due to excessive remodeling of the ship's body, overloading and inept steering.
The Sewol had extra passenger cabins added to its superstructure before being put into service and therefore should have carried less freight than it was originally designed to do to improve stability.
The Korean Register of Shipping had approved Sewol’s operation on the condition that the freight load be reduced from 2,437 tons to 1,450 tons and the “passenger weight” from 88 tons to 83 tons.
It also said the amount of ballast water, which helps maintain stability, had to be increased from 1,923 tons to 2,300 tons.
However, the prosecution’s investigation showed Sewol was carrying more than double the appropriate freight load and did not have enough ballast.
An inspection of the salvaged ferry will be able to determine the exact weight of the freight inside and whether overloading caused the sinking.
An earlier probe by a special investigation committee of the Sewol disaster showed the ferry had also been loaded with 410 tons of iron bars for the Jeju Naval Base.
The prosecution pointed to an unskilled helmsman as one of the causes of the sinking.
During Captain Lee Joon-seok’s trial, he claimed the helmsman surnamed Cho had steered inappropriately at the time of the sinking.
However, the special investigation committee raised the possibility of mechanical problems with the steering gear and instruments onboard malfunctioning.
There were also some claims that the ferry sank after a collision with an unidentified vessel.
Last December, a netizens investigation team named Zaro uploaded a documentary on the sinking, which contained a video of the Vessel Traffic Services Center’s radar of Jindo at the time of the incident. The documentary showed the radar captured an unidentified object, which Zaro claimed was a submarine.
Ewha Womans University chemistry and nanoscience professor Kim Kwan-mook, said, “The radar is able to capture iron, but in order to be able to capture it, its size needs to be considerably large _ we can only conclude that the object was a submarine.” He helped Zaro collect evidence to make the documentary.
However, the Navy denied this and vowed to take legal action over the "false claim," stating "there were no submarines in operation nor were any exercises being conducted in waters at the site of the accident.”