Jakarta - Searchers on Tuesday located the wreckage of a plane that crashed with 15 people on board in the jungle of Indonesia's easternmost province of Papua, officials and media reports said. The wreckage of the Twin Otter plane was spotted near the Ampisibil area of the Bintang Mountains district, but the fate of the 15 people it was carrying was not known, the state-run Antara news agency reported.
The chief of Jayapura's Sentani Airbase, Colonel Suwandi, was quoted as saying that a team of eight personnel, including a doctor, would depart for the crash site in a helicopter. He said a plan of action had been drafted in case the chopper could not land.
The plane, belonging to the state-run Merpati Airlines, was carrying 12 passengers, including two babies, and a crew of three, when it went missing Sunday during a scheduled 55-minute flight from Jayapura to Oksibil. The plane lost contact with ground control about 15 minutes after takeoff.
Papua, a mountainous, thickly forested province, relies on air transport, owing to its limited road network.
