Sewol Salvage Operations

Written by Kim Singsing

Commemorating the 500th day of the Sewol Ferry disaster last August 28th, the controversial documentary film, “Diving Bell: The Truth Shall Not Sink with Sewol” directed by a former MBC reporter and a photographer, was finally released for free on YouTube. There already have been more than 577,000 views of the Korean version since its free release on September 1. None of the major theaters in Korea agreed to show the film, for unknown reasons.

Lee Sangho, one of the two directors, tweeted after the premiere of the documentary film that he would willingly risk going to jail for the film. The reasons why the government did not allow a private contractor to work on the Sewol rescue efforts are thoroughly examined in the documentary.

The filmmakers were invited to present the film at Busan Int’l Film Festival (2014), Salaya Int’l Film Festival(2015) and were awarded Grand Prix at Fukuoka Asian Film Festival (July, 2015). Check out the English verison  https://goo.gl/HSiw8N

Salvage Operations

China’s state-run Shanghai Salvage Co. and a Korean company consortium were chosen to initiate salvage operations for the sunken Sewol Ferry in July. Shanghai Salvage Co. offered to raise the sunken Sewol ferry at a cost of 85.1 billion won ($74.6 million). Its technical skills were evaluated as the second best to the Smit Salvage consortium. The salvage operations started in September and are expected to last for about one year.