Jamshedpur: A 15-member team from the Indian Navy and the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) on Thursday morning recovered the body of both the missing pilots from Jharkhand’s Chandil Dam, three days after a two-seater training aircraft crashed a few minutes after taking off from Jamshedpur Airport.

Saraikela-Kharsawan Superintendent of Police (SP) Mukesh Lunayat, while talking to the media, said, “The body of the trainee pilot and his trainer has been recovered. Search operations are onto recover the missing plane.”

“The bodies have been sent for postmortem and will be handed over to their family members after the autopsy is completed,” said Lunayat.

The officer further added that the trainee’s body was identified by his parents.

Another senior police officer involved in the search operation said, “Local fishermen spotted a body early this morning floating near the dam, entangled in watery bushes. From the uniform on the body, it was suspected to be one of the pilots on the training plane.”

The officer said upon receiving the information, the search team rushed to the location and pulled out the body from the water.

The deceased trainee pilot has been identified as 19-year-old Shubrodeep Dutta, while his instructor has been identified as Shatrujeet Anand, the official added.

The deceased trainee pilot was the only son of his parents, Subarno and Pradip Dutta.

According to reliable sources, a team from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) has arrived in Jamshedpur to investigate the aircraft crash.

Chandil Dam is located around 40 kilometers from Jamshedpur. The dam is on the Subarnarekha River, with a catchment area of 1,963 square kilometers. The dam has a height of 56.80 meters and a length of about 720.10 meters.

The training aircraft with two pilots took off in their Cessna 152 on Tuesday morning around 11 am from Jamshedpur Airport. A few minutes after takeoff, the plane vanished from the radar. The plane belonged to Alchemist Aviation.

The Jamshedpur district administration and Alchemist Aviation immediately launched a massive search operation in the Dalma forest range to locate the plane and the pilots.

Inspector General of Police (IG) Ranchi Zone Akhilesh Jha told The Avenue Mail that they had received information about the plane crashing in Chandil Dam.

“With the help of the fisheries department and NDRF, search operations were launched in the Chandil Dam on Tuesday evening, said the IG.