8 naval technicians from Visakhapatnam were on aircraft

Visakhapatnam: Eight persons among the 29 on board the Indian Air Force transport plane which went missing on Friday morning were from Vizag’s Naval Armament Depot. The AN-32 was on a ‘courier flight’ from Chennai to Port Blair, transporting service personnel to the strategic islands near the Malacca Straits, where India has a military base.

The NAD has a unit near the Andamans and technicians are often taken there by such flights for work. The team from Vizag was flying to Port Blair to work on the INS Batti Malv, a Bangaram-class patrol vessel of the Indian Navy designed for interdiction against fast-moving surface vessels.