Helicopter spotted crashed on a mountain 17 days after being lost, bodies of pilots found

The wreckage of a Cambodian military helicopter that went missing more than two weeks ago with two pilots aboard was spotted Monday on a mountaintop, the government and state news agency reports said.

A Defense Ministry statement posted on its Facebook page said that a search flight spotted the wreckage of the Chinese-made Z-9 helicopter in the heavily forested Cardamom Mountains in the southwestern province of Pursat.

The helicopter with two pilots were on training flight in bad weather when air force headquarters lost touch with it on July 12. An intensive search for the missing aircraft was launched the next day.

Military recovery personnel sent to the crash site found the body of one pilot inside the wrecked helicopter, state news agency AKP reported. The body of the other pilot was spotted about 200 meters away, state broadcaster TVK reported later.

A photo shared widely on social media yesterday showed a helicopter broken into several pieces, partially covered by foliage. The photo and its source could not immediately be verified.

In 2014, another Chinese-made Z-9 helicopter crashed in a pond south of the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, killing two generals who headed the air force’s helicopter unit along with two pilots. MDT/AP