FORT RAMON MAGSAYSAY, Palayan City, Nueva Ecija — Rescuers finally reached the location of the ill-fated Cessna plane that crash-landed in a forested portion of Sierra Madre mountains in the boundary of Pantabangan, Nueva Ecija and Maria Aurora, Aurora province around 1:35 p.m. on Wednesday.
1Lt. Catherine Hapin, information officer of the Philippine Army’s 7th Infantry Division, said rescuers safely found flight instructor Captain Albert Galban and student trainee Alexis Trinidad.
Hapin said rescuers immediately gave Trinidad first aid for his unspecified injury.
Citing reports from the ground, Hapin said the crash site was hard to reach and with poor telephone signal.
Combined police and military personnel were dispatched for rescue operation at about 2 p.m. Tuesday after the trainer plane crash-landed at around 12:30 pm. on the same day.
The ill-fated Cessna 152 type trainer aircraft was owned by Fly Fast Aviation.
The instructor and the student pilot were on a cross-country flight that departed the Lingayen airstrip in Pangasinan en route to Baler, Aurora when the incident happened. (Marilyn Galang/PNA)
