09-04-2009, 01:48 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>SMS helps IAF men zero in on wreckage</b>
PNS | New Delhi
An SMS received on YS Rajasekhara Reddyâs chief security officer ASC Wesleyâs mobile phone at 12.06 pm on Wednesday provided a major clue to help locate the wreckage of the Bell-430 helicopter in the dense jungles of Kurnool.
While the nationâs biggest ever search and rescue mission was on to locate the chopper flying YSR, the mobile service providers informed the crisis management team in Hyderabad about the SMS sent to Wesley. It was received nearly two hours after the helicopter was reported missing at 9.13 am on Wednesday. Elaborating upon the SMS breakthrough, officials said that when the full-scale search started around 1.30 pm and the IAF launched helicopters from Hakimpet, the Secunderabad-based Helicopter Training School, the area to be scanned was over 10,000 sq km. The tracing of the SMS reduced the radius to be scoured to about 4 sq km, they said.
<b>The first few hours of search proved futile as the two Chetaks and an MI-8 helicopter, along with a Dornier and an Avro plane, found no trace of the crash. The IAF then decided to go by its own standard operating procedure for search and rescue.</b>
This line of probe led to the fact that the<b> helicopter had last established radio contact with ground at Shamsabad and Chennai airports at 9.10 am on Wednesday</b>. This vital information guided the IAF team to draw the <b>likely flight plan of the helicopter.</b> Moreover, the wide sweeping of the area throughout Wednesday evening and night by synthetic aperture radars of three SU-30 fighter jets also provided crucial data of the area to the crisis management team.
Meanwhile, the SMS was analysed by experts and the rescue team, including the IAF officers, managed to work out the co-ordinates and make a reasonable guess about the area where the mobile handset could be, sources said here on Thursday.
<b>The co-ordination of the information provided by the service providers and radio contact timing helped the two Chetak helicopters find the wreckage of the chopper at 8.30 am on Thursday. The exact location was 154714 North and 784263 East latitude. The mobile handset was most probably flung out of the helicopter during the crash. Sources said the other four handsets were in all probability destroyed. </b>
After the burnt chopper was finally detected, a team of police commandos heli-dropped on a hilltop near the wreckage site and discovered four bodies. The fifth body was found at 10.30 am, they added. All the bodies were then winched up as the helicopters could not land in the difficult terrain. Then these were transported to the Kurnool airfield.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
PNS | New Delhi
An SMS received on YS Rajasekhara Reddyâs chief security officer ASC Wesleyâs mobile phone at 12.06 pm on Wednesday provided a major clue to help locate the wreckage of the Bell-430 helicopter in the dense jungles of Kurnool.
While the nationâs biggest ever search and rescue mission was on to locate the chopper flying YSR, the mobile service providers informed the crisis management team in Hyderabad about the SMS sent to Wesley. It was received nearly two hours after the helicopter was reported missing at 9.13 am on Wednesday. Elaborating upon the SMS breakthrough, officials said that when the full-scale search started around 1.30 pm and the IAF launched helicopters from Hakimpet, the Secunderabad-based Helicopter Training School, the area to be scanned was over 10,000 sq km. The tracing of the SMS reduced the radius to be scoured to about 4 sq km, they said.
<b>The first few hours of search proved futile as the two Chetaks and an MI-8 helicopter, along with a Dornier and an Avro plane, found no trace of the crash. The IAF then decided to go by its own standard operating procedure for search and rescue.</b>
This line of probe led to the fact that the<b> helicopter had last established radio contact with ground at Shamsabad and Chennai airports at 9.10 am on Wednesday</b>. This vital information guided the IAF team to draw the <b>likely flight plan of the helicopter.</b> Moreover, the wide sweeping of the area throughout Wednesday evening and night by synthetic aperture radars of three SU-30 fighter jets also provided crucial data of the area to the crisis management team.
Meanwhile, the SMS was analysed by experts and the rescue team, including the IAF officers, managed to work out the co-ordinates and make a reasonable guess about the area where the mobile handset could be, sources said here on Thursday.
<b>The co-ordination of the information provided by the service providers and radio contact timing helped the two Chetak helicopters find the wreckage of the chopper at 8.30 am on Thursday. The exact location was 154714 North and 784263 East latitude. The mobile handset was most probably flung out of the helicopter during the crash. Sources said the other four handsets were in all probability destroyed. </b>
After the burnt chopper was finally detected, a team of police commandos heli-dropped on a hilltop near the wreckage site and discovered four bodies. The fifth body was found at 10.30 am, they added. All the bodies were then winched up as the helicopters could not land in the difficult terrain. Then these were transported to the Kurnool airfield.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->