Amidst fears of a possible crash, an intensive search operation was under way off the Karaikal coast on Tuesday for the Dornier aircraft of the Coast Guard that went missing on Monday night with three officers on board.
Four ships each from the Coast Guard and the Navy, besides a Dornier and the Navy’s long-range maritime surveillance aircraft P-8I from INS Rajali at Arakkonam, were involved in the search operation to locate the missing aircraft CG 791.
The German-designed aircraft made by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited attached to 744 Fixed Wing Squadron of the Coast Guard here took off from the Air Station at Meenambakkam at 6.05 pm on Monday and completed its mission in the south Tamil Nadu coast and Palk Bay before it went missing at 9.23 pm from the radars at the Chennai and Tiruchirapalli airports.
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The aircraft with two pilots and a navigator was flying over 9,000 feet above the mean sea level, some 16 nautical miles off Chidambaram coast between Cuddalore and Karaikal, when it went missing from the radar.
The last contact it made with the Air Traffic Control in Chennai was at 9.01 pm, when one of the pilots reported that they were “off task” (completed the mission) and the aircraft was returning to base.
“We have expanded the search operations as the wind flow is from south to north,” Coast Guard’s Regional Commander (East) Inspector General S.P. Sharma said. Dismissing speculations over the airworthiness of the aircraft and experience of men on board, he said that CG791, inducted only last year, had flown over 700 hours so far, while the pilots had clocked over 2,000 hours.
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As for the reasons behind the incident, he said an inquiry would be ordered soon and it would be premature to assign any reason without an inquiry. While the weather was favourable for safe flying, the aircraft, scheduled to return at 10.30 pm on Monday, had endurance (sufficient fuel) to fly for one more hour, he said.
The families of Deputy Commandant Vidyasagar (pilot), Deputy Commandant M.K. Soni (co-pilot) and Deputy Commandant Subhash Suresh (navigator) have been informed about the incident.