Why did the munitions blow up?
by Ranil Wijayapala
The investigators are yet to access the immediate disaster zone to
examine the cause of the fire at the Army Camp complex at Salawa,
Avissawella, last Sunday (5) night.What ensued that night still remains
a mystery to the authorities as well as the general public.
The extent of damage caused by the series of explosions that
continued from Sunday evening till around 10.30 pm on June 5 and the
intermittent explosions till noon the following day, reminded us of a
war torn Northern town during the conflict.
As the Government is in the process of compensating the people
affected from this unexpected incident and rebuilding the houses and
other infrastructure facilities policy decisions have been taken to
shift ammo dumps of this nature into lesser populated areas in the
country.
The incident at Salawa Army camp which sheltered three Army
institutions Independent of each other, namely the Sri Lanka Army
Volunteer Forces Headquarters, Logistics Command Headquarters and the
Central Arms and Ammunition Depot, has raised questions regarding
practices followed on maintenance of such ammo dumps.
The Defence Ministry appointed a Tri Forces committee to inquire into
the incident, parallel to the investigations launched by a Court of
Inquiry appointed by the Sri Lanka Army, the Criminal Investigation
Department and the Magisterial Inquiry conducted into the death of a
soldier.
The Tri Forces Committee appointed by the Ministry of Defence
comprises Air Vice Marshal Kishan Yahampath, Director Ground Operations
and Director Training of the Sri Lanka Air Force, Rear Admiral
Dharmendra Wettewa, Director General Operations of the Sri Lanka Navy,
Major General Dhananjaya Karunaratne, Chief Field Engineer of the Sri
Lanka Army, Dimuth Atapattu, Assistant Secretary to the Ministry of
Defence, Colonel Michael Wanniarachchi and Lt. Colonel Ranahewa of the
of the Sri Lanka Army Ordnance Corps.
The ammo dump in question has been established during the 1990's when
the Salawa area was not so populated and the Sri Lanka Army was in the
process of shifting to the camps located in lesser populated areas.
Most of the ammo subjected to explosion were brought to the country
during the conflict period and included ammunition for Multi Barrel
Rocket Launchers, 122mm, 130mm and 152 mm artillery rounds and many
other ammo including those used by the armour tanks.
Investigations have revealed certain factors about the competency of
the officers in charge of the ammo dump in Salawa, raising concerns
about the required training and qualification to maintain such armouries.
These artillery rounds and other ammunition stocks have to be stored
in Igloo type storage facilities, in the scientific way of storing
artillery rounds, with two layers of walls separated from sand layers to
retain the shock in an event of an accidental explosion.
However, such facilities were not available in most of the ammo dumps
maintained in Army camps.
Despite the need, necessary funding was also not available to have
such storage facilities even after the end of the war in May 2009.
Security Forces officials claim this ammo stocks would have been better
stored had the funds been available.
However, the Sri Lanka Air Force and the Sri Lanka Navy managed to
have proper dumps compared to the facilities available with the Sri
Lanka Army, as the Navy and Air Force had lesser manpower.
The Tri Forces get equal allocation of funds from the Budget, but the
manpower in the Army is around 170,000 compared to the 50,000 personnel
in the Navy and a lesser number in the Air Force.
Therefore, the claims by former members of the government are
rejected by the Sri Lanka Army on the grounds that though there were
plans to have proper storage ammunition dumps, the much needed funding
was not available to implement the proposals.
Instead of having such facilities the former government focused
attention to establish Defence Headquarters in Pelawatte, making use of
the land of the Sri Lanka Army Volunteer Forces headquarters which was
shifted to Salawa to facilitate the process of constructing the Defence
Headquarters. Now the Volunteer Forces Headquarters has been fully
destroyed in the explosion and will need to be re-established elsewhere.
Incidents of this nature are not unique. The biggest tragedy of the
ammo dump explosion was reported way back in January 27, 2002 in Lagos,
Nigeria that killed 1,100 people and displaced 20,000 more. While this
year India's biggest ammunition depot in Pulgaon in Maharashtra exploded
in May, killing 17 defence personnel.
It is apparent the Sri Lanka Army was in the process of addressing
the issue of maintaining armouries of this nature in a proper way though
not in possession of proper dumping facilities at present.
However, the Sri Lanka Army including Army Commander and the high
ranking officers Army officers, Tri Forces personnel and other disaster
management mechanisms has to be praised for the effective action they
have taken to control civilian deaths at zero level amidst such a huge
explosion, and keeping the death toll of the incident only to one
soldier. |
