Video: Safety jackets essential to climb Sigiriya

4 July 2012 02:37 pm

The Sigiriya Central Cultural Fund Manager Vajira Ferdinand said from today it was compulsory for foreign tourists to wear special protective jackets if they wished to go beyond the ‘Lion’s Paw’ when climbing the Sigiriya Rock Fortress.

Twenty Sri Lankans including two children and two foreign tourists were injured in another wasp attack yesterday. They had to be rushed to the Sigiriya Divisional Hospital.

After this wasp attack only foreign tourists were allowed to proceed beyond the ‘Lion’s Paw’.

A security officer at the site said this was being done because foreign tourists had to be given priority but it was mandatory to wear protective jackets if they wished to they proceed further.

He said some of the jackets had been sent to the cleaners and there was a shortage of jackets to cater to all those who climb the Rock.
A Central Cultural Fund official said this month alone there had been three wasp attacks. (Kanchana Kumara Ariyadasa)