New technology leads to search for 'Disappeared"

THE search for 'The Disappeared" - two young Belfast men murdered by the IRA and believed to have been buried in Co Meath - resumed this week when a digger was brought onto the site at Coghalstown near Wilkinstown and excavation commenced. A preliminary survey of the site was carried out by experts last March after the Independent Commission for the Location of Victims" Remains decided on a fresh initiative in the long campaign to recover the bodies but this is the first time that new technology has been drafted in the attempt to bring the agony of the victims" families to an end. Commission officials and advisers, which include Detective Superintendent Geoff Knupfer, who worked on the infamous Moors Murders investigation in England; Detective Inspector Jon Hill, who has worked with the Metropolitan Police in London, and Detective Inspector Jody Crowe of An Garda Siochana, embarked on the search at Coghalstown bog where two West Belfast 25 year olds, Seamus Wright and Kevin McKee, are believed by local people to have been secretly buried in 1972. They both disappeared from their homes and were never seen again. They are widely believed to have been murdered by the Provisional IRA. In March, the first signs of a renewed search for the two bodies were evident at Coghalstown, just off the Ladyrath-Rathkenny Road at Wilkinstown. A field in a bog laneway just off the road had been pegged out with markers and was awaiting further examination. Sources close to the investigation at that time said that the team"s intention was to clear large areas of trees and scrub along the lane and that a geophysical examaination of the entire area would then take place. The geophysical process, widely used to trace archaeological remains on the route of the M3, uses ground-probing radar to 'x-ray" what may lie beneath. This technology was not available during previous searches at Coghalstown and Oristown 10 years ago. This week, search personnel moved a large earthmover onto the site and a slow digging operation was in progress. Three personnel working on the site watched as the digger slowly excavated earth at the base of a small forest in the area. A temporary headquarters for the team involved in the search has been erected near the excavations. It is believed that they may be on site site for some weeks. The Coghalstown site has already been investigated when Gardai organised digs at Wilkinstown - and at Oristown where the body of Brendan McGraw, another of 'the Disappeared", is believed to have been buried. The two searches ended in May 2000 with no indication that the bodies were buried there. However, the introduction of new technology, in the form of geophysical equipment, has given new impetus to the search. Ten years ago, Kells Gardai had been overseeing the excavation of a cutaway at Emlagh Bog, four miles from the town, in the search for Brendan McGraw. The searches for Mr McGraw"s body, and the other two men, followed what is believed to have been the securing of fresh information by the independent commission.