A Laos military helicopter heading for Houaphan province in northern Laos with 19 passengers onboard and 4 crew members has been missing in the past 36 hours after it departed an airport in the capital Vientiane, Laos.
The helicopter, the MI-17 helicopter, with registration number RDPL-34062 lost contact with air traffic controller 1:10pm local time on July 27th, after leaving the Wattay International airport for Houaphan district.
An official with Division 703 of the Lao Air Force told RFA’s Lao Service.
We cannot confirm whether the aircraft has crashed or had to execute an emergency landing, because we have no proof at this time, Higher level commanders will not allow us to confirm anything.
The identities of the passengers of the helicopter are not currently known.
The Laos aviation industry, which is been outdated aircraft is also known for attributing air disaster to pilots error, most times, the statement from state media always comes out with the disaster was the pilot error and not the outdated aircrafts.
Some major air disasters that had happened in 2 years are :
On May 17 last year, a Ukrainian-made Antonov AN-74TK-300 aircraft owned by the Lao military crashed while approaching an airport in Xiengkhuang, killing 17 passengers, including Lao Deputy Prime Minister Douangchay Phichit, Minister of Public Security Thongbanh Sengaphone, and two other high-ranking officials.
The group was en route to attend the 55th anniversary of “strategic gains” made by the Lao military during the Indochina War, according to state media.
The crash, which was attributed to a technical error by the pilot, is the second deadliest air disaster in Lao history, after the crash of Lao Airlines Flight 301 seven months earlier.
On Oct. 16, 2013, Flight 301—an ATR-72 turboprop—plunged into the Mekong River during bad weather as it approached Pakse Airport in southern Laos’s Champasak province, killing all 49 passengers.
Six Australians, seven French, five Thai, three South Koreans, two Vietnamese, as well as passengers from China, Myanmar, Taiwan and the U.S. were killed in the crash, which was also attributed to pilot error.