Inclement weather has affected the ongoing operations to retrieve the mortal remains of the personnel onboard the IAF’s ill-fated An-32 aircraft are on.
Defence PRO, Wing Commander Ratnakar Singh on Saturday said that the rescue team of IAF, Indian Army’s Special Force and civilian members is present at the crash site.
“The rescue operations are being curtailed due to incessant rains and heavy clouding. No helicopter could fly today due to bad weather,” Singh said.
“Bad weather is hampering hovering by helicopters to do winching operations which are mandatory for all the rescue operations and recovery of mortal remains. All efforts are being made to heli-lift the mortal remains of the IAF personnel at the earliest to their parent base Jorhat,” he said.
He added that the rescue teams are standing by and operations will resume as soon as the weather improves.
The ill fated AN-32 aircraft took off from the Jorhat air base on June 3 and lost contact with the ground agencies a few minutes after flying.
Although search operations launched immediately to trace the aircraft that remained missing since then, it is only recently that the aerial search spotted the crash site at a remote location along the Indo-China border in Arunachal Pradesh.
All the 13 air warriors who were on board the aircraft died in the crash and efforts are on to retrieve and bring back the mortal remains of the martyrs.