The families of seven fishermen lost off the southeast coast when two fishing boats sank today called for the vessels to be raised.
The Pére Charlesand Honeydew IIsank just hours apart off the Waterford coast on January 10th.
The families of the dead crewmen want to find out why the boats sank and if any bodies remain on board.
Bernie O'Connor
The Pére Charleswas carrying five men when it went down and remains some 30 metres under water on the seabed four kilometres off Dunmore East, Co Wexford. The remains of Tom and Pat Hennessy, Billy O'Connor, Pat Coady and Andriy Dyrin have never been recovered.
Skipper Ger Bohan and Polish crewman Tomasz Jagla drowned when the Honeydew IIsank, while two survivors were discovered in a life raft 20 hours later.
Its wreckage has been located around five kilometres southeast of Ram Head in west Waterford.
"We want the boat raised so that a proper investigation can be done," said Bernie O'Connor, daughter of Billy O'Connor. "We have had an independent assessment done on the footage of what the navy has given us and to be absolutely certain that no bodies remain on board, and to determine cause of the causality, we think it is necessary to lift the Pére Charles."
Divers searched both vessels but nothing was found.
Family members, who have already met Minister of State for Transport Pat the Cope Gallagher, are to lobby local politicians to support their calls to have both boats lifted.
"The worst of it is that there's no closure for any of the families, and I'm speaking on behalf of all of the families," continued Ms O'Connor. "We want it raised and we are going to call on all our local politicians to help us in any way that they can just so that we can finally get some closure on it and find out exactly what happened.
"The Marine Investigation Board are established to investigate the cause, and then they make recommendations to the Minister for Transport to avoid similar casualties in the future, so I don't think they can investigate it properly if they leave the vessels lying on the seabed.
"They are only going to be able to investigate it if they raise it."