Pilot rescued, co-pilot missing
A training plane of a private flying academy crashed into the River Jamuna at Chauhali in Sirajganj about 12:30pm on Saturday because of engine failure.
One of the two pilots, Shamsuddin, 25, a resident
of Jamalpur, has been rescued. The other pilot, Kamrul Hasan, 26, resident of Banani in Dhaka, went missing.
The police said the plane, Cessna 152, had taken of the Flying Club about 10:00am and it crashed into the Jamuna when it was trying to land on a shoal in the river due engine failure.
The Bangladesh Flying Academy said the engine of the plane failed and the pilots tried to land on a shoal.
But the pilot failed to do so and lost control as the engine suddenly got back power, the club said.
‘Pilot Samsuddin could jump into the river but the co-pilot failed to do so. Samsuddin was rescued by the local people,’ additional superintendent of police in Sirajganj Delwar Hossain Sayeedi said.
The injured pilot was shifted to Dhaka in a flying club plane in the evening.
The 98 Composite Brigade of the army and a seven-member diver team from Rajshahi joined the rescue operation in the evening. The missing pilot could not be traced till 6:30pm.
The Chauhali upazila nirbahi officer, Saiful Islam, told New Age the plane had sunken into the river.
On September 23, a F-7 fighter of the Bangladesh Air Force crashed into the Chittagong Port channel but the pilot survived by ejecting himself just before the crash.
Another Bangladesh Air Force training plane crashed on October 22, 2009 in which both the pilots were injured.
