Indonesian rescuers find a body and wreckage of plane in mountainous region

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesian rescuers on Sunday recovered a body in the ongoing search for 11 people aboard a plane that is believed to have crashed the previous day while approaching a mountainous region on Sulawesi island during cloudy weather.

The rescue team retrieved the body of a man in a ravine about 200 meters (656 feet) deep on the slope of Mount Bulusaraung on Sunday afternoon, located near scattered aircraft debris. The evacuation of the body is underway, said Muhammad Arif Anwar, who heads Makassar’s Search and Rescue Office and is the mission coordinator.

Teams also found additional wreckage, including parts of the aircraft frame and passenger seats, and visually identified what is believed to be the engine, Anwar said.

The body has not yet been identified, but is believed to have come from the turboprop ATR 42-500 that was on its way from Yogyakarta on Indonesia’s main island of Java to Makassar, the capital city of South Sulawesi province, when it vanished from radar on Saturday shortly after being instructed by air traffic control to correct its approach alignment.

The plane, operated by Indonesia Air Transport, was last tracked at 1:17 p.m. in the Leang-Leang area of Maros, a mountainous district of South Sulawesi province. It was carrying eight crew members and three passengers from the Marine Affairs and Fisheries Ministry who were aboard as part of an airborne maritime surveillance mission.

A rescue team on an air force helicopter on Sunday morning spotted what appeared to be a small aircraft window in a forested area on the slope of Mount Bulusaraung, said Muhammad Arif Anwar, who heads Makassar’s Search and Rescue Office. Rescuers on the ground later retrieved larger debris consistent with the main fuselage and tail scattered on a steep northern slope, Anwar told a news conference.

“The discovery of the aircraft’s main sections significantly narrows the search zone and offers a crucial clue for tightening the search area,” Anwar said, “Our joint search and rescue teams are now focusing on searching for the victims, especially those who might still be alive.”

Ground and air rescue teams continued moving toward the wreckage site Sunday, despite strong winds, heavy fog and steep rugged terrain that have slowed the search, said Maj. Gen. Bangun Nawoko, the South Sulawesi’s Hasanuddin military commander.

More than 100 personnel, supported by the Specialized Search and Rescue Units of the army’s elite forces, were deployed across several sectors. The teams have been dealing with heavy rain and thick fog with visibility of only about five meters at the summit, Nawoko said.

“This affected movement and even forced the cancellation of a planned vertical descent for safety,” he said.

Photos and videos released by the National Search and Rescue Agency on Sunday showed rescuers were trekking along a steep, narrow mountain ridgeline blanketed in thick fog to reach scattered wreckage.

Indonesia relies heavily on air transport and ferries to connect its over 17,000 islands. The Southeast Asian country has been plagued by transportation accidents in recent years, from plane and bus crashes to ferry sinkings.