An AlH helicopter of the Indian Air Force with three crew on board went missing from a remote location in Arunachal Pradesh on Tuesday evening.
A Defence spokesman confirmed this on Tuesday and said that the IAF helicopter was deployed for flood relief operations in Arunachal Pradesh. “The chopper took off from Pilputu helipad near Sagalee in Arunachal Pradesh, located 50 kms northwest of Itanagar and it has not landed back at Naharlagun so far,” said the Defence Spokesman while talking to The Pioneer.
“The helicopter took off around 3.48 pm from Sagalee helipad and it is yet to land back at Naharlagun helipad. We have alerted all the stations and agencies and to ready for a probable emergency landing in nearby areas due to bad weather,” he said.
It may be mentioned here that some states of the northeastern region including Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Manipur and Mizoram are having incessant rainfall and bad weather for the past few weeks.
The helicopter was engaged to lift some stranded passengers due to road blockade between Sagalee and Itanagar.