Never to come back home again

Family members of two of the airmen killed during the attack in Katunayake share their grief

The LTTE air attack on the Katunayake SLAF base in the early hours of Monday morning claimed the lives of three airmen. Two of them were D.Kumara, and Nandima Shanthilal. Kumara’s brother Sumith said his brother was so duty conscious that he seldom took leave even to come home.

“His dream was to fight for his country,” he said. He was so duty conscious that he even hesitated to take an additional day’s leave when he came home on a short holiday. ‘I will not leave the services till the war ends so that my wife and children can live in peace,’ this is what Kumara said the last time he came home,” Sumith said.

Kumara has two sons aged 8 and 6. Nandima Shanthilal’s wife Nadika Hemamali wept recalling how her husband had consoled their little daughter as he was leaving home the last time he came on leave.

“Little did he know that he will never come back when he told his 17-month-old daughter that he would bring her Lollipops and Yoghurt when he came again,” she said through her tears. He has a sister too in the Air Force while his brother-in-law serves in the Navy.

According to his wife, he had left home at dawn on Sunday, although he was on leave, because he was acting for a friend who had to take leave on that fateful day.