Despite lacking positive visual sighting of the two missing pilots and the OV-10 Bronco 630 attack plane that went down four months ago, search missions are still ongoing, with the United States Navy's USS Henson joining anew the recovery efforts.
Joint Task Force Bronco (JTFB), the task force created by the Western Command for the search operations, released an update Friday on the OV-10 aircraft, which has been missing since June 23, 2013.
JTFB chief Brig. Gen. Conrado V. Parra, concurrent commander of the 570th Composite Tactical Wing, said massive search operations were undertaken by various agencies under the control of joint task force.
"The latest of these efforts is the participation of the US Navy's USS Henson that indicates a suspicious contour located approximately 58 meters below sea level at the vicinity," Parra said.
On October 8 to 9, a remotely-operated vehicle (ROV) from the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) verified the image but "unfortunately revealed that it was a rock and coral formation," he added.
The JTFB chief said that with almost all shallow parts of the sea had already been scanned using sonar equipment, this leaves the deep parts of the sea which are over 1,000 meters the most probable site of the OV-10 crash.
"However, this can only be scanned using the ROV of Shell Philippines which will be available only in December. Considering the almost four months of continuous search and rescue operations with negative results, we are now switching to search and recovery operations," Parra said.
Joint Task Force Bronco has been scouring Honda Bay some 5.9 nautical miles off the Puerto Princesa Airport, the area believed to be where the turbo-prop aircraft crashed shortly after its night proficiency flight last June 23.
The pilots were identified as Maj. Jonathan Ybañez and 1st Lt. Abner Trust Nacion.
http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=2&sid=&nid=2&rid=576148
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