159 Mr. Byrne asked the Minister for Defence if the logs of the Irish naval vessels involved in Operation Tuskar off the Wexford coast in the wake of the crash of the Aer Lingus aircraft St. Phelim in 1968 confirm that, during the search and salvage operation, a message was received that a British trawler had recovered something in its nets some miles distant from the search area, that when one of the Irish naval vessels was instructed by the search command centre to proceed to rendezvous with the British vessel, one of the British naval vessels involved in the search also began to steam towards the location of the trawler, that a boat from the British naval vessel reached the trawler before a boat from the Irish naval vessel and that the officer in charge of the British naval boat recovered an object some nine feet long and three feet wide which was seen by the Irish naval personnel, that the object recovered is not mentioned anywhere in the accident inspectors report, nor is it listed in the materials recovered which were brought ashore and used in the reconstruction of the air disaster, and that the object does not seem to have been passed on to the accident investigation.
Written Answers. - Operation Tuskar.
Question:
The log books of the Irish Naval Service vessels involved in Operation Tuskar have been examined. There is no record in these log books of the incident to which the Deputy refers.