Peruvian airline reports plane missing in jungle

LIMA, Peru -- A Peruvian airliner carrying 46 people, including eight children, disappeared Thursday amid cloud-covered mountains in the Amazon jungle. Heavy rain hampered the search effort. Peru's air force halted helicopter missions to find the plane late in the afternoon.

"The air search has been suspended due to rain. We are focusing on organizing ground teams to send out," said Avelino Flores, a Civil Defense official in Luyo, the village closest to the area where the plane was believed to have gone down.

The area was at least six hours away by foot, over difficult terrain.

TANS Airline flight 222 was about three minutes from landing at an airport in Chachapoyas, a city in the jungle-covered mountains 400 miles north of Lima, when radio contact was lost, said Jorge Belevan, chief spokesman for the state-owned airline.

Belevan said there were four crew and 42 passengers aboard the plane, including eight children, and a Belgian husband and wife identified as Christophe Dubois and Sofia Porfirio.

"We still don't know if the plane made an emergency landing because it is prepared for that type of emergency," said Lizandro Toro, another TANS spokesman.

But John Elio, president of an association of Peruvian pilots, said an emergency landing in the Chachapoyas area was virtually impossible because of the mountainous terrain.

In Belgium, Foreign Affairs spokesman Didier Seeuws said the passengers included a Belgian who had lived in Peru for years and was married a Peruvian. He had no other information.

"It is still unclear," Seeuws said. "Even our embassy in Lima doesn't know at the moment."

John Elio, president of an association of Peruvian pilots, said an emergency landing in the Chachapoyas area was virtually impossible because of the mountainous terrain.

The plane, a Fokker 28, was rented from Peru's air force and was built in 1965. The Fokker 28 is a twin-engine turbo jet that can carry as many as 62 passengers.

Belevan initially said that flying conditions were good Thursday morning but noted that the weather in the jungle can change quickly.

Meteorologist Abraham Levy said it was not raining but low-hanging clouds draped the mountains near Chachapoyas at the time the plane was to land.

TANS was set up 40 years ago to fly to remote jungle towns that private airlines did not service because the routes were not profitable. Chachapoyas is close to ancient Indian ruins and is visited by foreign tourists.