Girja Shankar Kaura
Tribune News ServiceNew Delhi, April 2
Two deep-penetration Jaguar fighter aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) today went missing in bad weather over the Sonmarg valley during a training sortie near the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir.
An IAF spokesman here said the two aircraft went out of radio contact about 1 and 1.30pm in the afternoon because of bad weather conditions prevailing over Gund in the Sonmarg Valley area. They were part of a four aircraft formation which had got airborne at 12.34 pm from Srinagar.
“The four aircraft were on a training valley flying sortie during which they encountered bad weather. While two Jaguars managed to get out of the bad patch and returned to the Srinagar air base, two others got stuck in bad weather and lost radio contact with the ground,” the IAF spokesman said.
A massive search and rescue operation has been launched by the Air Force to trace the missing aircraft and the pilots. At least two helicopters have been pressed into service for the search and rescue operation but the prevailing bad weather conditions in the area were preventing the choppers from going near the near over which the aircraft lost Radio Telephony (RT) contact.
“We are not still using the connotation that the aircraft have been lost,” the officer said while not divulging the names of the two pilots who were flying the aircraft.
Asked if the warplanes could have crossed the LoC into the Pakistani side, the officer ruled this out, saying the aircraft were flying over Gund, which is about 50 km inside the LoC on the Indian side.
Besides, he pointed out that they were south bound for Ambala which would further reduce the possibility of the aircraft crossing the LoC into Pakistan territory.
The officer said the two aircraft were carrying normal fuel to give them “enough endurance” to fly back to their base at Ambala.
The spokesman also said that the IAF would not declare a “crash” till such time the wreckage was located.
He also ruled out the possibility of the aircraft which went missing being part of the security cover provided to President APJ Abdul Kalam during his visit to the Siachen sector.
