Saturday, September 10, 2011

Rescue chopper gone missing in Papua

Sunday, September 11, 2011 09:41 AM
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Indonesian Army's Bell 412 chopper, which has been sent to locate a crashed Susi Air aircraft at Wamena mountains in Papua, lost contact with the control tower on Saturday afternoon.

Cendrawasih Military Commander Maj. Gen. Erfi Triassunu said that the helicopter might have made an emergency landing.

Erfi confirmed that the chopper departed from Timika at 2:45 p.m. local time in a mission to help locate Susi Air aircraft.

At 3:51 p.m., the control tower reported that it lost contact with the five-crew chopper, Erfi was quoted by kompas.com on Saturday evening.

According to the flight plan, the helicopter should have landed in Wamena at 6 p.m..

"Perhaps, it may have made an emergency landing somewhere," Erfi said.

Erfi said that the Army would track down the route taken by the missing chopper on Sunday morning.

http://www.thejakartapost.com