Search For Missing Air Force Plane On Day 4, Why It's Been Fruitless

Chennai: The massive hunt for an Indian Air Force plane that went missing in stormy monsoon weather over the Bay of Bengal on Friday with 29 people on board has entered its fourth day, but no signs of any wreckage have so far been found.

"We will keep revising the search area," said Inspector General Rajan Bargotra the Coast Guard. He said there was "no signal from an emergency locator transmitter (ELT) or beacon that would have made search much easier." The ELT can be picked up by satellites to help narrow down the possible location of the missing plane.  

Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard officials have said the search is continuing and an underwater search with a submarine is likely to launch tomorrow. The rescue operation was hampered over parts of the weekend by choppy seas and thick monsoon clouds in the search area.

Sixteen ships, a submarine and six aircraft are searching for the plane that disappeared on a routine re-supply flight to remote islands in the Bay of Bengal on Friday.

The Russian-made AN-32 was on its way from Chennai to Port Blair, the capital of Andaman and Nicobar islands, when it vanished from radar.

There were 21 military personnel on board the missing plane including six crew. The remainder were civilians and some family members of soldiers deployed on the islands.