Wreckage of missing Indonesian plane ‘found’ by Papua residents

Villagers in eastern Indonesia’s Papua say that a plane which went missing in the province Sunday with 54 people aboard has crashed, an official said Sunday. “The plane has been found (by villagers). According to residents, the flight had crashed into a mountain. Verification is still in process,” said the transport ministry’s director-general of air […]

Villagers in eastern Indonesia’s Papua say that a plane which went missing in the province Sunday with 54 people aboard has crashed, an official said Sunday.
“The plane has been found (by villagers). According to residents, the flight had crashed into a mountain. Verification is still in process,” said the transport ministry’s director-general of air transportation, Suprasetyo, who goes by one name.
The Trigana Air Service plane was flying from Papua’s provincial capital, Jayapura, to the Papua city of Oksibil when it lost contact with Oksibil’s airport, said Transportation Ministry spokesman Julius Barata. There was no indication that the pilot had made a distress call, he said.
The twin turboprop plane was carrying 49 passengers and five crew members on the scheduled 42-minute journey, Barata said. Five children, including three infants, were among the passengers.
Local media reports said all the passengers were Indonesians. The airline did not immediately release a passenger manifest.
Much of Papua is covered with impenetrable jungles and mountains. Some planes that have crashed there in the past have never been found.
Dudi Sudibyo, an aviation analyst, told AP that Papua is a particularly dangerous place to fly because of its mountainous terrain and rapidly changing weather patterns. “I can say that a pilot who is capable of flying there will be able to fly an aircraft in any part of the world,” he said.