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Navy surveillance aircraft crashes off Goa coast; two on board missing

By FnF Defence Correspondent | PUBLISHED: 25, Mar 2015, 13:59 pm IST | UPDATED: 25, Mar 2015, 14:00 pm IST

Navy surveillance aircraft crashes off Goa coast; two on board missing Panaji: An Indian navy surveillance aircraft crashed off Goa with two officers on-board missing on Tuesday night.

Rescue operations were underway after a Dornier aircraft plunged into the sea, some 25 nautical miles off Goa, around 10:00 pm on Tuesday.

"Last evening a navy Dornier during a routine training sortie off Goa ditched into sea," a navy statement said early on Wednesday.

"One survivor rescued. Full scale search and rescue operation launched to locate two more officers (one pilot and one observer)," it added.

It is the latest in a series of deadly disasters to hit the navy, and comes just months after a naval ship sank off the southeastern coast of India leaving one worker dead and four others missing.

A fire aboard a nuclear submarine killed two officers off the Mumbai coast last February which led to the immediate resignation of the navy chief.

18 sailors were also killed in August 2013 when INS Sindhurakshak burst into flames in Mumbai harbour.