by Our Defence Correspondent
Welders at Colombo Dockyard Limited were putting the final touches to their repair job on P-470, a Fast Attack Boat of the Sri Lanka Navy, inside the port of Colombo last Wednesday.

By 10 a.m., they had finished their work. None too soon either, since the gunboat was scheduled to put to sea for engine and speed trials at 2 p.m.

Suddenly, at about 10.30 a.m., Dockyard workers saw clouds of black smoke belching from the inside of the vessel, as it lay in the drydock of CDL.

The alarm was raised, and frantic Dockyard executives called up the Port Fire Brigade. Meanwhile, CDL workers grabbed hoses and maneuvered water pumps towards the blazing vessel.

But suddenly, from inside the vessel came two resounding explosions.

Two grenades had exploded in the hull of P-470.

The blasts caused chaos, with the craft blazing more fiercly than ever. Soon, it was a sheet of flame from end to end.

Sirens wailing, units of the port fire brigade raced to the scene, and the firemen swung into action, aiming their powerful fire hoses at the inferno.

But the threat of more grenades exploding kept people at a safe distance. In addition, it was now quite clear that the gunboat could not be saved, and the firefighters and CDL wotrkers concentrated on keeping the blaze from reaching any of the yard’s other installations or vessels inside the yard.

Sri Lanka Navy sailors from the nearby Rangala base inside the harbor were also rushed to the spot, but could do little that the firefighters couldn’t.

By 12.30 p.m., P-470 had burned itself out.

A 250 million rupee warship had been reduced to a smoking hulk.

Thus ended the days of one the navy’s strangest vessels, which had been nothing but trouble since it was purchased two-and-a-half years ago.

Investigate
The navy commander, Vice Admiral Cecil Tissera, quickly appointed a high level team of officers to investigate the mysterious incident. It is headed by the Western Naval Area Commander, Rear Admiral Terrence Sundaram. Among the officers in the team is a senior commodore from navy headquarters.

The chief suspicion is that the fire was an act of sabotage.

The main question is: Who left two grenades on board a ship which was going to undergo repairs inside a civilian shipping yard?

Before the navy hands any of its vessels over to a private firm for any length of time, it is standard procedure to first strip it of all its ammunition, grenades, and other warlike materials. This includes the hundreds of 20 milimeter shells of P-470s two main guns, and its smaller 14.5 mm weapons.

The guns themselves cannot be easily removed, being fixed to the hull, and are always wrapped up in heavy canvass tarpaulins, which prevent any curious CDL worker from touching them. Not that CDL workers have laods of time on their hands to be messing around, since it handles several large merchant ships at any one time. Repairing the navy’s boats is only a small part of the company’s operation.

Although the gunboat’s captain would be responsible for ensuring that the vessel was stripped of shells and grenades, the investigating committee is looking into the possibility that the grenades could have been introduced by officers or saiklors without the knowledge of the captain, a member of the committee told The Island.

However, with the Rangala base being home to more than 300 sailors, the possibilities are endless.

The possibility that the sabotage was the work of LTTE cadres who may have infiltrated the staff of Colombo Dockyard is considered remote. If a Tiger did manage to get past all the security screening that takes place before CDL hires a worker, he could have picked a far bigger target than P-470, since literally every one of the navy’s warships are brought to this yard for repairs at some point each year. The fact is that no other shipping firm in the country has CDL’s facilities, and its yard is used extensively by the navy. For this very reason, the yard is heavily guarded, and it is highly unlikely that a Tiger could sneak two grenades inside.

Apart from CDL’s own security measures, the yard happens to be in a far corner of the port, which is itswelf very heavily guarded. Unauthorised personnel just cannot enter through any of the port gates, where navy sentries, policemen and the port’s own security force stand guard.

Possibilities
One of the least likely possibilities is that of it being an accident. Although there had been some welding going on shortly before the fire, it is highly unusual for a steel hulled vessel to catch fire so quickly. CDL’s workers and engineers have worked on thousands of ships, and nothing like this has ever happened. A ship is not a bale of straw which will burst into flames at the drop of a match.

So if the fire was sabotage, then who stood to gain from the ship’s destruction, apart from the dubious possibility that it was the LTTE?

P-470’s strange history may have something to do with it.

A few months after the war broke out in April 1995, the then navy commander (Vice Admiral Tissera was not at the top post then) authorised a deal with Shaldag Corporation of Israel for the purchase of two such craft.

Our readers may remember that this column commented on the irregular features of the deal back then.

For starters, Sri Lanka had never before pruchased anything from Shaldag Corp. All the boats bought from Israel had been from Israeli Aircraft Industries (IAI).

Even more peculiar was the fact that one of the warships, P-469, was not new at all, but was a second hand vessel. This was sold to the navy at 2.5 million dollars.

However, the second boat, P-470, was brand new, Shaldag Corp. made up for the low price of P-469 by overpricing P-470 and charging 4.5 million dollars.

However, from virtually the day they arrived in Sri Lanka, both boats gave a huge amount of trouble. Their engines were of poor quality, and were constantly breaking down. Defects in their hulls were also a constant factor, and both vessels spent much time undergoing repairs in harbor.

So ended P-470’s wretched days. It served little purpose, did virtually nothing in the fight against the LTTE, and was a massive drain of scarce resources. Little wonder that the navy and the defence ministry didn’t say a word about its destruction to the public.