Bad Weather May Halt TWA Salvage Efforts

Already frustrated with the slow pace of recovery efforts, officials searching for clues in the crash of Trans World Airlines Flight 800 may have to shut down their salvage operation over the holiday weekend because of bad weather.

Two hurricanes and a tropical storm are active in the Atlantic Ocean, with Hurricane Edouard expected to move up the Eastern Seaboard, potentially producing waves as high as 10 feet and endangering scuba divers.

Rear Adm. Ed Kristensen, director of the Navy salvage and diving efforts, said heavy winds and storms this weekend could shut down the recovery operation.

“We’re watching it, and we’ve made contingency plans to bring all our small boats off the water,” Kristensen said. “And we’ll have to knock off the scuba diving if the water is too rough.”

He added that the storm could sweep unrecovered material and bodies farther out to sea. “The potential is there to disrupt the debris field,” he said. “We’ll have to come back out after the storm and see what we have.”

Officials have warned local police departments and the Coast Guard to be on the lookout for aircraft pieces that might wash ashore from New York as far south as the Washington area.

“With the Labor Day weekend coming, I would ask all of the bathers and beach-goers and lifeguards and all of the people on the beach to please take this very, very seriously,” said FBI Assistant Director James K. Kallstrom.

“If they see any floating debris or personal effects . . , would they please treat them with care and call the police?”

Flight 800, en route to Paris, exploded July 17 shortly after takeoff from New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport. All 230 passengers and crew aboard were killed.

Investigators, meanwhile, are broadening their examination of debris from the center of the plane, where they believe the initial explosion occurred. They plan to create a mock-up of the roof area of the plane’s double-decker passenger area above the center area.

“There’s interest in looking at the fire damage in that area too,” said Robert Francis, vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board.

Also on Thursday, officials in the Suffolk County Medical Examiner’s Office announced that the pilot, Capt. Steven Snyder, 57, of Stratford, Conn., whose body had been recovered earlier, has been positively identified.

To date, 211 bodies have been recovered, two of which remain unidentified. The remaining 19 have yet to be found.