The Indian Air Force An-32 aircraft, which went missing after taking off from Jorhat on June 3, remained untraced in Arunachal Pradesh even after extensive search and rescue operations till Tuesday night.
The An-32 aircraft, which was on route to Mechuka in Arunachal Pradesh with 13 people on board, lost contact with ground forces ar around 1 pm on June 3.
The Navy’s Long Range Maritime Reconnaissance aircraft P8i and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) satellites were pressed into service to locate the plane but without any success, officials said.
“There is no sign of the aircraft. Search and rescue operation is on full swing,” IAF spokesman Wing Commander Ratnakar Singh told the media in Shillong.
Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Eastern Air Command, Air Marshal RD Mathur is at the Jorhat Air Force Station monitoring the search and rescue operations. He also interacted with the families of the missing IAF personnel.
Mathur was briefed about the coordinated efforts by the Indian Army, the Indo-Tibetan Border Police and other civil agencies.
The Navy aircraft departed from INS Rajali in Tamil Nadu and shall carry out the search with Electro Optical and Infra Red sensors in the thickly forested areas between Jorhat and Mechuka where the An-32 disappeared, a Navy official said.
The ISRO has pressed into service its RISAT series of radar imaging satellites to look for the missing aircraft.
