Early Reports of The Air Tigers
The LTTE credits the formation of the Air Tigers air-wing to Colonel Shankar, alias Vythialingam Sornalingam, a diploma graduate of Hartley College in Point Pedro. He has an Engineering Diploma in Aeronautics from Hindustan Engineering College in Tamil Nadu, India.
On November 27–28, 1998, Tamilnet reported the LTTE-operated Voice Of Tiger radio station had claimed “Aircraft of the Air Tiger wing of the Liberation Tigers sprinkled flowers over the cemeteries of the slain LTTE cadres in Mulliyawalai,” during the annual Heroes Day celebrations. Earlier in the month, the web based news agency reported (November 19, 1998) an unidentified aircraft allegedly belonging to the LTTE had been spotted in the Thondamanaaru region in Jaffna by Sri Lankan Navy officials. The report said it was also believed the Tigers had built an airstrip in the Mullaitivu army base after it was overrun by the LTTE in 1996.
| Type of Aircraft | Quantity |
|---|---|
| Micro Light Aircraft | 2 |
| ZLIN 143 | 5 |
| Helicopters | 2 |
| Unmanned aerial vehicles | 2 |
On November 27, 1998 Tamilnet reported Deputy Minister for Defence Anuruddha Ratwatte had scoffed at speculation that the LTTE has acquired aircraft, claiming the reports were part of an LTTE strategy of psychological warfare. Three days later, the news service reported unconfirmed reports of a Tiger helicopter being sighted in the Batticalloa‐Amparai region. The report also said The Sunday Times Military analyst Iqbal Athas had reported military intelligence UAVs had taken images of the LTTE helicopters and Mulativu airstrip. The Sunday Times Situation Report said (November 1, 1998) “Senior SLAF officials suspect the helicopter on ground to be similar to R44 Astro — a small, light, four-seat, piston-engined civilian helicopter produced by the Robinson Helicopter Company since 1992. Sri Lankan newspapers corroborated discovery of an R44 Astro and also suggested that Australian LTTE contacts had facilitated the purchase of two Australian-made AirBorne microlight aircraft. The Singapore based Asian Tribune e-newspaper claimed (July 28, 2006) the LTTE had acquired two Czech-built Zlin Z‐143's, according to eyewitnesses in Eliranpuram, Pudukudiyiruppu and Meerukandi, who also claim to have frequently seen the Cessna Skymasters flying overhead for several months. The report also said it was believed the acquisition had been made between April and July 2006.
Similarly, news of LTTE airstrips in the north had made periodic appearances in the southern Sri Lanka media, including a May 28, 2005 admission by the Norwegian‐led Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission of having sighted an airstrip in the Iranamadu area, in northern Sri Lanka. The new air strip was reportedly located near the ruins of another Tiger air strip that was abandoned due to air force bombing in the late 1990s. On March 16, 2007 the Daily Mirror defence analyst Sunil Jayasiri reported military intelligence had revealed the LTTE had constructed yet another airstrip in the South East of Pudukiduiruppu area in the East. “The Pudukiduiruppu airstrip is 1,250 metres long and therefore even a Hercules C-130 aircraft could land with a full load of cargo”, the report said. The Sri Lankan Government alleged that the aircraft have been shipped with foreign aid. That year, Air Tigers smuggled ten unassembled Czech fighter jets onto their bases.
Read more about this topic: Air Tigers
Famous quotes containing the words early, reports, air and/or tigers:
“Betwixt the black fronts long-withdrawn
A light-blue lane of early dawn,”
—Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892)
“Journalism without a moral position is impossible. Every journalist is a moralist. It’s absolutely unavoidable. A journalist is someone who looks at the world and the way it works, someone who takes a close look at things every day and reports what she sees, someone who represents the world, the event, for others. She cannot do her work without judging what she sees.”
—Marguerite Duras (b. 1914)
“Up from the South at break of day,
Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay,
The affrighted air with a shudder bore,
Like a herald in haste, to the chieftain’s door,
The terrible grumble, and rumble, and roar,
Telling the battle was on once more,
And Sheridan twenty miles away.”
—Thomas Buchanan Read (1822–1872)
“The ocean is a wilderness reaching round the globe, wilder than a Bengal jungle, and fuller of monsters, washing the very wharves of our cities and the gardens of our sea-side residences. Serpents, bears, hyenas, tigers rapidly vanish as civilization advances, but the most populous and civilized city cannot scare a shark far from its wharves.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)