Search crews have found the bodies of three men who went missing when their helicopter crashed in Papua New Guinea last week.
The bodies of Australians Russell Aitken, 42, licensed aircraft maintenance engineer Emmett Fynn, 36, and New Zealander Antony Annan, 49, were on board a Bell 206 chopper that went missing near Mt Hagen in the PNG highlands on Thursday last week.
Helicopter operator Hevilift said the downed chopper's tailboom was sighted from the air just after 7am on Friday local time and ground crews were immediately sent to the location.
"We knew then that the area where we had been searching was correct and we concentrated the ground search teams upstream of the location of where the debris was found," said group managing director Paul Booij in a statement.
"Unfortunately our worst fears were realised this morning."
The helicopter was found at about 1pm on Friday in an area near the Purari River, 8km from Bawata in the Western Highlands.
The three men were declared dead at the scene.
The company says the wreckage indicates a crash landing.
The helicopter had put out a mayday signal shortly after it took off from a nearby InterOil site on Thursday.
A search was launched involving seven civilian helicopters, a fixed-wing aeroplane fitted with electronic surveillance equipment, ground crews and planning and air support from the Australian military.
But it was a villager who spotted the first sign of the crash, a week after it had happened.
Finding a piece of chopper's "Fly-Away" kit alongside the Purari River river, the villager alerted rescuers who soon found more pieces of helicopter equipment.
"We are devastated that this has happened. Every one of us had hoped to find them alive and now we have to deal with the reality," Mr Booij said.
"We will be conducting a thorough investigation of what went wrong and why it went wrong, and we will also be co-operating fully with all authorities in their investigations.
"Until those investigations are complete, we will not be entering into any speculation."
News home