A Chilean air force plane with 21 people aboard, including a popular TV presenter, has crashed in the Pacific near the Juan Fernandez islands.
The CASA military plane tried twice to land at the airport on the remote island but strong winds buffeted the aircraft and it was later lost from sight, said Felipe Paredes, a local council member who was in the airport’s control tower at the time.
The remote Chilean archipelago, about 515 miles west of Chile’s coast, is known for possibly having inspired the novel Robinson Crusoe.
Rescuers in boats were searching for the plane, but the mayor of Juan Fernandez, Leopoldo Gonzalez, said luggage had been found in the water and it was clear the plane crashed.
“We assume that there was an accident and that there are no survivors,” he said.
President Sebastian Pinera said: “This is a blow to our country. In these times of anguish and uncertainty is when unity is most needed.” Defence minister Andres Allamand called it a “particularly difficult” situation, but said that for now the plane was still listed as “missing”.
Authorities said popular Chilean television personality Felipe Camiroaga was flying to the island for a programme on the reconstruction of Juan Fernandez island following the magnitude-8.8 earthquake and tsunami that wiped out its main town on February 27th, 2010.
The 44-year-old TV presenter was one of five people from Television Nacional's Good Morning Everyone show who were travelling to the island.
Besides hosting the morning programme, Camiroaga also hosted the popular programme Nocturnal Animal and co-hosted the Vina del Mar music festival in 2009 and 2010.
“We are extremely upset,” said TVN executive director Mauro Valdes.
Also on board was businessman Felipe Cubillos, a brother-in-law of the defence minister who had been working on post-earthquake reconstruction.
The air force plane took off from the capital Santiago at 2pm and lost contact with air control almost four hours later, according to aviation authorities.
AP