India on Sunday deployed two long-range maritime reconnaissance aircraft in the Indian Ocean to help trace the Malaysian plane that mysteriously went missing over two weeks ago, carrying 239 people on board.
The two surveillance aircraft — P8-I Poseidon of the Indian Navy and C-130J Super Hercules of the Indian Air Force — took off on Sunday from Subang Airport, Malaysia for search and rescue operations in the Indian Ocean along the southern corridor.
They arrived here on March 21 following a commitment from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to assist Malaysia and render all possible assistance to it in locating the missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH 370, the Ministry of External Affairs said.
Both the aircraft have long endurance capabilities coupled with state-of-the-art electro optronic and infra red search and reconnaissance equipment on board, it said in a press release.The P8-I aircraft has the added advantage of on-board radars and especially-designed search and rescue kits.
Both Indian aircraft took off this morning for the search areas allotted by the Aeronautical Rescue Coordination Centre (ARCC) after extensive briefings.Even though they are likely to encounter cyclonic conditions en route, both aircraft Captains decided to skirt bad weather areas to reach the search sectors allotted by the ARCC. Both aircraft are likely to undertake 10-hour sorties on Sunday.
India has been participating in search and rescue operations from March 11 in the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal. Five ships and six aircraft of the Indian Navy and Indian Coast Guard carried out search from March 11-21 from the Andaman and Nicobar Command.