Navy spokesperson Captain D K Sharma said, “Navy has been deployed in full force in the Bay of Bengal for the search and rescue operation”.
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Indian Coast Guard was the first to launch the search and rescue operation of the missing Indian Air Force aircraft said that the incident happened between 9.14am and 9.23 am.
The AN-32 was on a routine sortie from Air Force Station Tambaram to Port Blair and reported to have 29 personnel onboard, including the crew. The other people on board were civilians, some of them family members of soldiers deployed on the islands.
The Press Trust of India news agency reported AN-32s can fly for four hours without refuelling.
The plane was overhauled and went through an upgrade in September 2015, according to the note given to the ministry.
The air force, navy and coast guard were using ships, planes and helicopters to conduct a massive search.
The IAF has pressed into service a C130 plane along with two AN32.
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The islands are near the Malacca Straits, one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes which link the Indian Ocean to the South China Sea and East Asia. The aircraft lost radar contact at 9.12am and the last call the pilot made to the Air Traffic Control (ATC) was 16 minutes after the take-off, sources added.
