When an F-4E Phantom fighter jet plummeted into the waters off Hwaseong in August 2022, the two Air Force pilots aboard managed to eject just moments before impact. Floating in the choppy sea with fuel and thick smoke drifting across the waves, their immediate survival depended on whoever might reach them first. Help came not from a military vessel, but from a small local fishing boat crewed by two migrant workers from Sri Lanka. Four years after pulling the downed aviator safely from the water, those two men have earned the right to build a permanent future in the country whose pilot they saved. The Ministry of Justice said Friday it had officially granted Skilled Worker (E-7-4) visas to both Sri Lankan nationals — whose identities were withheld by officials — recognizing their exceptional contribution to public safety and the national interest. The decision offers a rare path to long-term residency in a country that maintains notoriously strict immigration policies. Arriving in Korea in April 2022 under the non-professional employment permit system (E-9), the two men were working l