Post date: Mar 16, 2012 5:14:42 PM
NIKKALUOKTA, SWEDEN (MARCH 16, 2012) (TV4 - The search for a Norwegian military transport plane with five people on board that went missing on Thursday (March 15) in a remote part of Scandinavia continues to Friday (March 16).
Bad weather and avalanche risk is hampering rescue efforts in northern Scandinavia to find a missing military plane with five people on board.
The plane went missing during a trip from Evenas in northern Norway to Kiruna in Sweden.Helicopter searches for the missing aircraft were being hampered by bad weather and a risk of avalanches in the remote region at the northern extreme of Scandinavia.
"We have not found the aircraft yet so we have not done well, but we continue the search, we do have problems with heavy winds and other disturbances and poor visibility and so on," Stefan Sydberg from the Swedish army said in Nikkaluokta where a search centre has been set up.
Nikkaluokta is located around 19 kilometres east of Sweden's highest mountain Kebnekaise which is 2,106 metres above sea level and lies about 150 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle.
Swedish sea and air rescue officials said they lost contact with the aircraft, which was taking part in the NATO Cold Response exercise, at 1345 GMT.
No signal had been picked up from the emergency beacon of the missing plane, a four-engine Lockheed C-130J Hercules military transport belonging to the Norwegian air force.
The beacon would normally be triggered in case of a crash.
But Sydberg said the search continued.
"The search continues. One is trying to find new areas where we can get confirmation, through heat cameras, that there could be something. But the work is the same as yesterday," he said.
The missing craft is a four-engine Lockheed C-130J Hercules military transport belonging to the Norwegian air force.