E-Paper
‘May Day call’ to be focus of probe in Arunachal army copter crash: Officials
Officials said the Air Traffic Control (ATC) received a ‘May Day call’, suggesting a technical or mechanical failure, from the pilots prior to the Arunachal army copter crash on Friday
A technical or mechanical failure could be the cause of the army helicopter crash in Arunachal Pradesh which killed five persons on Friday, according to a statement issued by Defence authorities on Saturday.
According to the statement, the Air Traffic Control (ATC) received a ‘May Day call’, suggesting a technical or mechanical failure, from the pilots prior to the crash.
“Prior to the crash, the Air Traffic Control (ATC) had received a MAY DAY call suggesting a technical or mechanical failure. This will form the focus of the Court of Inquiry, which has been immediately constituted to investigate the causes of the accident,” it said.
“It is reported that the weather was good for flying operations. The pilots had more than 600 combined flying hours on ALH-WSI and over 1,800 service flying hours between them,” the statement added.
Meanwhile, the Indian Army, in a statement on Saturday afternoon said that the search and rescue mission has ended with the recovery of the mortal remains of the fifth individual.
The deceased have been identified as Major Vikas Bhambu, Engine Technician Ashwin KV, Major Mustapha Bohara, Rohitashva Kumar and Biresh Sinha.
The Indian Army also offered condolences and assured to stand firmly with the families.
An Indian Army Aviation Advance Light Helicopter (Weapon Systems Integrated) - ALH WSI based at Likabali (Assam) crashed at Arunachal Pradesh’s Migging at around 10.30am on Friday.
A joint search operation with teams from the Army and Airforce was immediately launched and mortal remains of four were recovered from the site.
The area, where the helicopter crashed, is extremely remote and thick jungle made the search operations challenging, according to the defence statement.
