Wreckage of missing Pakistan cargo plane found; five crew still missing

A Boeing 737 cargo plane that went missing off Pakistan's coast has been located, but five crew members remain missing after the aircraft crashed into the Arabian Sea. The wreckage was recovered on Wednesday following a 12-hour search by the Pakistani navy and civilian authorities. Source: BBC, SCMP

What happened

The K2 Airways flight was en route from Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, to Karachi when it reported a navigation system problem at 9:18 PM local time on Tuesday. Three minutes later, radar contact was lost about 155 nautical miles west of Karachi. Source: AP, Al Jazeera Flight data from Flightradar24 showed a dramatic sequence: the plane dropped 5,000 feet, then climbed 6,000 feet in seconds, before entering a near-vertical dive from 36,550 feet at a rate of 22,400 feet per minute. Source: CNN, The Guardian Anthony Brickhouse, an aerospace safety consultant, noted, "Anytime you see something extreme like that, it catches your eye, but it is too soon to say what any of it means." Source: DW, Reuters

Search and recovery

Authorities deployed multiple air and naval assets, including the frigate PNS Zulfiqar, to locate the aircraft. Rough monsoon seas and deep waters—about 3,000 meters in the area—hampered efforts. Source: AP, SCMP Pakistan's airports authority said the wreckage was found 53 nautical miles south of Ormara, a port town on the Arabian Sea coast. Source: BBC, SCMP

Crew and aircraft

The five missing crew members were identified as Captain Muhammad Rizwan Idris, First Officer Faisal Jatoi, flight engineers Muhammad Hamid and Muhammad Arif Siddiqui, and aircraft loader Muhammad Taufiq Khan. Source: SCMP The 27-year-old Boeing 737-400, originally a passenger plane, was converted to a freighter in 2012 and was K2 Airways' only aircraft. Source: Al Jazeera, CNN Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif expressed his "heartfelt condolences" to the families. Source: DW, CN:N