Navy vessels found three bodies and debris from a military aircraft carrying 122 people that went missing flying between Tanintharyi Division's Myeik and Rangoon on Wednesday afternoon, according to the Burma Army commander-in-chief's office Facebook post on Thursday morning.
The plane carried 106 passengers - mostly families of military personnel - and 14 crew members. The Chinese built Y8-200 F plane was flying from Myeik to Yangon and was believed to be transporting military servicemen and their families.
It was on a regular, weekly flight that takes in several coastal towns.
Communication with the flight was lost on Wednesday, half an hour into the short routine trip. Meanwhile, The New York Times reported that residents said weather in the area along the flight path was bad, with pounding monsoon rains.
The commander-in-chief's office said the plane lost contact with air traffic control at 1:35 pm (3:05pm Singapore time) on Wednesday, about half an hour after takeoff.
The search and rescue operation found landing gear that apparently belonged to the plane and the bodies of two adults and one child, along with two life jackets.
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The Facebook page, the main source of official information about the crash, said the plane, carrying about 2.4 tons of cargo in addition to the 122 people aboard, was received in March past year and since then had logged 809 flying hours.
"So, the plane is believed to have crashed into sea", an officer at Southern Command told Anadolu Agency on condition of anonymity due to restrictions on talking to the media.
Nine Navy ships and three airplanes are searching for the plane in the Andaman Sea to the south of the capital, Yangon.
More than 40 ambulances and scores of medics and emergency staff were heading to the fishing town of Sanlan where boats carrying bodies were set to arrive around mid-day, said Hla Thein, a member of a hospital emergency team.
The four propeller plane is designed and manufactured by China's Shaanxi Aircraft Company and modelled on a Russian prototype.
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