ROZSYPNE (Ukraine): International investigators got their first look on Thursday at the wreckage of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, finally reaching the site two weeks after a missile brought down the plane.

Fighting between Ukrainian troops and separatist rebels raged around them but the investigators called their brief inspection visit a success. Clashes along routes to the wreckage site had kept the delegation from reaching the area to find and retrieve bodies that have been lying in open fields where midsummer temperatures have hovered around 90 degrees (32 degrees Celsius) for the last several weeks.

But the investigators were allowed early on Thursday afternoon through a checkpoint leading to the crash site at the village of Rozsypne by a rifle-toting militiaman who then fired a warning shot to prevent reporters from accompanying the convoy. The militiaman, who gave his name only as Sergei, said there was still fighting in Rozsypne as the Ukrainian army continues an offensive to take back swatches of territory from the rebels.

The team of police and forensic experts from the Netherlands and Australia spent about an hour inspecting the scene before returning to their base in the rebel held city of Donetsk base before the evening.

Australian Federal Police commander Brian McDonald said the visit was only a preliminary survey ahead of more comprehensive recovery work of bodies and victims’ personal belongings.

“We had a quick inspection of the site. Today was more about an assessment of the site than it was of a search,” said McDonald, who was in police uniform. As many as 80 bodies are still at the site, said Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, speaking to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation from Ukraine.

Ukrainian national security spokesman Andriy Lysenko said a “day of quiet” was declared in response to a call for a ceasefire from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

Published in Dawn, August 1st, 2014