Sinister plane search in Chile: “The possibilities are difficult,” says the Minister of Defense

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(Credit: Chilean Air Force)

(CNN Spanish) - Karla Rubilar, spokeswoman for the government, said this morning that the president of Chile, Sebastian Piñera, has asked for international help to locate the plane that disappeared on Monday night on the way to Antarctica and that has been listed as damaged .

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"The president has asked for international help, it has been offered by the president of Argentina, the president of Brazil," Rubilar said from the Palacio de La Moneda in Santiago.

Rubilar said that Piñera suspended his trip to Argentina for the swearing-in of Alberto Fernández and that the missing plane is "the highest concern of the president of Chile at this time."

At the moment Piñera will not go to Punta Arenas.

For his part, General Arturo Merino, Commander-in-Chief of the Chilean Air Force, detailed the efforts being made to find the missing plane since Monday. He said that a total will be 13 aircraft - 9 Chilean and 4 international (Uruguay, Brazil, Argentina, United Kingdom) - participating in the search, as well as helicopters that will arrive from Santiago. On the other hand, the United States, Israel and Peru cooperate with satellites.

Merino added that the 6-day search rule could be extended to 10 if there are "indications" that they can be found by plane.

"It depends on what we find and what are the projections in the future," said Merino, who arrived this morning in Punta Arenas with defense minister Alberto Espina.

Merino said that the weather conditions on Tuesday “are not the best”, but they expect that to change at 4 in the afternoon.

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"The possibilities are difficult"

Chilean Defense Minister Alberto Espina said the chances of finding someone were "difficult."

"The possibilities are difficult, but I think it would be profoundly wrong that at the moment that we are with all the energy and determination, doing everything humanly possible, we may lose heart ... we have to make every effort to find them," he said.

In addition, he indicated that he knew the two pilots:

"They were two experienced pilots, therefore it is very important to know what happened," Espina told various media in Punta Arenas.

"Today we can only tell you that there will be no limitation of what we are going to do to get to know what happened," the minister added.

A C-130 Hercules aircraft of the Chilean Air Force ready to take off from the Santiago airport.

Type of airplane

It is a C-130 Hercules aircraft of the Aviation Group No. 10 of the Chilean Air Force, of American construction.

It was manufactured by the company Lockheed Martin, which states on its website that "it can be said without fear of contradictions that the C-130 Hercules is one of the most important aircraft in the history of aviation."

According to the company, that type of aircraft was first flown in 1954 and, to date, “more than 2,500 C-130s have been delivered to 63 nations around the world. Seventy countries operate them. ”

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Lockheed Martin indicates that the plane has "four powerful Allison T56-A-lA turboprop engines, each with 3,750 horsepower" and a "Hamilton-Standard four-blade propeller, which was only the first of many upgrades, modifications, changes in material and equipment, and other improvements for six decades that keep the Hercules last generation ”.

The C-130 is considered a workhorse of modern armies around the world. The four-engine aircraft is used to transport soldiers, equipment and cargo. Airplanes can carry up to 42,000 pounds of cargo or about 90 soldiers.

The first C-130 Hercules entered service in the US Air Force. UU. in the 1950s. However, the most modern variants, the "H" and "J" models, were introduced in the 70s and 90s, respectively.

In April, the Chilean Air Force published that the C-130 Hercules logistically and operationally supports “in all the activities of the #FACh Unit, since we are the only national Antarctic operator that is present 365 days a year”.

Passengers

According to the passenger manifesto of the Chilean Air Force, the C-130 Hercules transported 38 people: 17 crew members and 21 passengers, of which 15 belong to the Air Force, three from the Army, two from the engineering company INPROSER and one from the University of Magallanes.

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Course

According to the Chilean Air Force, at 10:21 am local time, the C-130 left Santiago and arrived at 14:44 at Punta Arenas. From there it took off at 4:53 p.m., with an estimated time of arrival at the President Eduardo Frei Montalva Antarctic Air Base at 7:17 p.m. However, the last report was received at 5:44 p.m. and the Air Force lost contact at 6:13 p.m. local time.

Crash Airplane C-130 Hercules