It has been more than 12 hours and there is still no sign of the missing Indian Air Force transport aircraft which went missing on Friday morning.
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IAF, Navy and Coast Guard launched a massive search and rescue operation to find the plane that went missing around 300 km off Chennai, and will continue through the night.
The passengers on board, who all were headed for the Tri-service Andaman and Nicobar Island Command, included a woman IAF officer Flight Lieutenant Deepika Sheoran, who is married to a Coast Guard officer based at Port Blair.
Speaking of the AN-32, sources said that it is a light military transport multi-purpose aircraft that can operated in various climate conditions, including hot climate (up to + 50°C) and from the mountain airfields up to 4500 m elevation.
According to a source, on July 2, throttle movement was found to be slow “which restricted a normal revving up of the engine”, on July 7, there was a hydraulic leakage form the port wing root and on July 14, pressure was found to be leaking from the port door of the craft.
One submarine, eight aircraft and 13 ships have been deployed to track the upgraded plane which made the last radio contact at 0846 hours, 16 minutes after take off from Tambaram air base. Full-scale Search and Rescue (SAR) operations were launched a little after noon, and are still underway. A submarine has also been diverted to the area.
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Four aircraft and 12 ships have been deployed for the operation, a Ministry of Defence spokesperson said. A spokesman for India’s defense ministry says the Indian air force has lost contact with a transport plane AN-32 with 29 people on board. “All efforts are being done to trace the plane and the service personnel travelling on board”, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar said on Friday evening. Four Coast Guard ships are also involved in the operations. We will get results soon, Indian Air Force captain D.K. Sharma told reporters. The Russian built twin engine AN 32 aircraft had undergone an upgrade in Ukraine.
