Authorities have retrieved the crashed Cessna training aircraft and the bodies of its two passengers at a crash site in Luna, Apayao, the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) disclosed Friday, August 4.
(Photo courtesy of CAAP)
CAAP said it has suspended the operations of the Echo Air International Aviation Academy Inc., the operator of the Cessna 152 aircraft with Registry No. RP-C8598, while investigation is ongoing to determine the cause of the crash.
The wreckage of the aircraft has been located by search and rescue (SAR) teams at Sitio Matad, Barangay Salvacion, Luna, Apayao.
“The SAR teams recovered two bodies believed to be the two occupants of the ill-fated Cessna 152 aircraft,” CAAP said in a statement.
The Cessna aircraft went missing last August 1 after departing from Laoag International Airport in Ilocos Norte en route to Cauayan Airport in Isabela then Tuguegarao Airport in Cagayan.
The aircraft did not arrive at Cauayan Airport. The aircraft transmitted its last position report approximately at 32 nautical miles northwest of Alcala, Cagayan.
The CAAP sent personnel from the Aircraft Accident Investigation and Inquiry Board (AAIIB) to Tuguegarao to start their investigation.
The incident is the fifth recorded crashed or missing aircraft by CAAP this 2023.
The other incidents include a Cessna 206 aircraft that crashed in Isabela on January 24; a Cessna 240 aircraft that went down in Camalig, Albay on February 18; an Alouette II ambulance helicopter that went missing in Balabac, Palawan on March 1; and an R44 helicopter that crashed in Lantapan, Bukidnon on July 28.