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Floating debris found in search for missing Chilean plane
PUNTA ARENAS, Chile, Dec 12, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Rescuers hunting for a Chilean air force plane
that went missing as it headed for Antarctica with 38 people aboard have recovered floating
debris and personal items that may be from the C-130, Chile’s military and Brazil President
Jair Bolsonaro said Wednesday.
The Chilean-flagged Antarctic Endeavour located debris that “could be part of the remains of
the sponges of the internal fuel tanks,” Air Force Commander Eduardo Mosqueira told a press
conference.
Mosquiera said the wreckage was located 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the plane’s last known
position when it disappeared from radar screens at 6:13 pm (2130 GMT Monday.
The C-130 Hercules cargo plane had been heading to Chile’s Eduardo Frei base, officials
said.
“We are going to carry out corresponding checks and… we are going to be able to determine
if they really are from the C-130,” Mosquiera said in Punta Arenas, the plane’s departure
point.
He said the recovered pieces of wreckage would reach Punta Arenas “tomorrow or in the next
few days.”
Bolsonaro tweeted that a Brazilian navy vessel, the Polar ship Admiral Maximiano, had
recovered more wreckage as well as personal items that may belong to the passengers.
“The parts of the plane and the objects were found approximately 280 nautical miles (518
kilometers) from Ushuaia in Argentina,” Bolsonaro said.
“The Brazilian navy ship remains in the search area in coordinated actions with the Chilean
authorities and two boats from the ship continue collecting remains,” he added.
Search vessels and planes from the United States, Uruguay and Argentina were also combing
nearly 1,000 square kilometers (385 square miles) around the plane’s last known position in
the Drake Passage, a tempestuous body of water south of Cape Horn and north of Antarctica.
Mosquiera said earlier that a decision had been taken to widen the search zone as
visibility and conditions were favorable.
“We still don’t have any new information, but we are making every effort to be able to find
the plane,” government spokeswoman Karla Rubilar told Chilean radio earlier Wednesday.
– Anxious relatives –
The Vatican said Pope Francis was following the situation closely and keeping the families
of the missing in his prayers.
Family members were gathering in Punta Arenas, 3,000 kilometers south of the capital
Santiago, to be close to the rescue effort.
Most of those on the missing plane are air force personnel, but also aboard were three
people from the army, two from a private construction company and an official from a Chilean
university.
Many of them were traveling to carry out logistical support tasks — including work on a
floating fuel pipeline and anti-corrosive treatment of machinery and other facilities at the
base, Chile’s largest in the Antarctic.
BSS/AFP/AU/08:40 hrs