Updated at 12:41pm
Chidambaram announces the death of Y S Rajasekhara Reddy and four others in a helicopter crash. Bodies were charred and the helicopter was broken and charred, says Chidambaram.The wreckage was found by Air Force helicopters at 0830 hours on a hillock which 8 to 9 km from Atmakur between two villages one of which is Velugodu.Bodies are still lying on the hillock and efforts are being made to retrieve them; Don't know how long the process will take, says Chidambaram.
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The news of the tragedy filtered out after a meeting of the Congress core group at the Prime Minister's house but fears grew since last night when search operations to locate the chopper were unsuccessful.
Exactly 24 hours after it went missing losing radio contact at 0930 hrs, Air Force helicopters from Bangalore today located the wreckage of the chopper on the Rudrakonda Hill, 70 kms from east of Kurnool.
Congress President Sonia Gandhi, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, senior ministers Pranab Mukherjee, A K Antony, P Chidambaram and senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel met in the core group to discuss the situation in the wake of the death of the powerful Congress leader in Andhra Pradesh.
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(Updated at 1117 hrs)
The bodies of 60-year-old Reddy, who led his Congress party to a spectacular second consecutive victory in the Lok Sabha and Assembly polls, and his Special Secretary P Subramanyam, Chief Security Officer A S C Wesley, pilot Group Captain S K Bhatia and co-pilot M S Reddy were found on Rudrakonda Hill, 40 nautical miles east of here, besides the mangled remains of the helicopter.
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There was no official confirmation of the deaths, but highly placed Congress sources in Delhi said that the bodies have been found. An official statement is expected shortly.
A scheduled meeting of the Union Cabinet was cancelled following the tragedy.
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(Updated at 1105 hrs)
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy was feared dead after five bodies were recoverd from the ill-fated chopper. As per highly placed Congress sources, five boides including Reddy's was found. An official announcement to be made shortly, the sources said. Union Cabinet meets to discuss the matter.
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(Updated at 1045 hrs)
24 hours after it went missing, the helicopter carrying Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy was today located on Rudrakonda hill, 40 nautical miles east of here, but there was no word on his condition.
"As of now we have located the helicopter. It is on top of a hill at a distance 40 nautical miles (70 kms) east of Kurnool. Our helicopters are there. We are trying to locate whether there are any survivors," Air Commodore Sagar Bharti of the Bangalore air command told reporters here.
"We are not sure if it has crashed or not. We are sure we have located the helicopter," he said. The signal code of the helicopter is 15471479.
Two helicopters were hovering over the area where the helicopter has been located and was looking for a spot to land.
Union Home Secretary G K Pillai told PTI in Delhi that it seems the helicopter has crash landed but there is no confirmation.
He said the Air Force was attempting to drop para commandos to the spot through ropes to look for survivors.The 11-year-old Bell 430 helicopter carrying besides Reddy, his special secretary Subramaniam, Chief Secretary A S C Wesley, pilot Group Captain S K Bhatia and co-pilot M S Reddy lost radio contact one hour after it took off the from the old Begumpet Airport in Hyderabad at 0835 hrs yesterday.
Army has also sent out a team of 70-80 para commandos to the area to find any possible survivors. The commandos brought from Bangalore are equipped with highly sophisticated weapons and modern gadgets to carry out search operations.
The helicopter was on its way to Chittoor in the southern part of the state where Reddy was to participate in a peoples' contact programme. Air Commodore Bharti said since it was a hill and forest area it was difficult for the helicopters to land there.
A low-flying aircraft of ISRO had last evening scoured the area and took 41 imagery photos of the area. Four choppers were also pressed into service for search operations in the Nallamalai forest in Kurnool district yesterday.
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Updated at 0945 hrs
- Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Rajasekhara Reddy's ill-fated helicopter located 40 km east of Kurnool on the Somasila hills of Nallamalai ranges, says an Air Force official.
- Two army helicopters were hovering over the area and
were looking for a spot to land, says the official.
- The official says he is not not in a position to say anything about fate of the condition of the passengers that included Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy, his Principal Secretary Subramanyam, Chief Security Officer A S C Wesley and the Pilot and Co-Pilot Group Captain S K Bhatia and Capt M S Reddy.
- K V P Ramachandra Rao, Rajya Sabha member and a close aide of the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister also says the chopper has been found.
- We are trying to find out if there are any survivors, says Bharti.