Mumbai: The Indian Coast Guard (ICG) today confirmed the recovery of another body belonging to a crew member of the ill-fated Pawan Hans helicopter that crashed off Mumbai coast in the Arabian Sea on Saturday.
A Coast Guard ship, Samrat, which has been deployed at the crash site, also intimated the recovery of aircraft parts such as rotor blades, main gear box, tail gear box, both engines and emergency locator transmitter. An ICG spokesperson said a Dornier aircraft flying from Daman also continued to scan the area to search for body parts and other debris.
The helicopter was carrying five senior Oil and Natural Gas Company (ONGC) officers and two pilots from Juhu helibase to Mumbai High, a state-owned offshore oil rig off Mumbai coast, when it went missing around 10.40am on Saturday.
The helicopter had lost contact with the air traffic control after take-off at 10.06am.
Following an extensive search operation, jointly conducted by ONGC, Coast Guard and Indian Navy, six bodies including one of the two pilots of ill-fated chopper were recovered. The search had been on for one more person who was missing.
Bodies of ONGC officials P N Srinivasan, R Saravananan, Jose Antony, Pankaj Garg and of the pilots Captain R Ohatkar have been identified; identification process for the sixth body is on.
The ICG said a high-level delegation from ONGC and Pawan Hans visited the Coast Guard headquarters to assess the situation and formulate further strategy for the recovery of body parts and debris if any.
The ONGC has key oil and gasfields off the Mumbai coast and Pawan Hans, a national helicopter carrier in India, routinely ferries employees and officers to the oil installations that are situated as far as 160 kilometres from the coastline. The field in the offshore include Mumbai High, the nation’s largest oilfield and Bassein fields, the largest gasfield.
Saturday’s helicopter crash is not the first accident with 36 people dying in Pawan Hans crashes in seven years, stated a newspaper report.
