Bijay Sankar Bora

Tribune News Service

Guwahati/New Delhi, Oct 6

Seven military personnel died in a helicopter crash near Tawang, the Tibetan monastery town in Arunachal Pradesh, near the Line of Actual Control (LAC), the de facto boundary between India and China, this morning. Only yesterday, Indian Air Force Chief Air Chief Marshall BS Dhanoa, at a press conference  in New Delhi, had said: “Our losses (crashes) during  peacetime are a cause for concern.”The deceased are Wing Commander Vikram Upadhyay, Squadron Leader S Tiwari, MWO AK Singh and Sergeants Gautam and Satish Kumar of the IAF and Sepoys E Balaji and HN Deka of the Indian Army.(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)The IAF has ordered a court of inquiry to ascertain the cause of the crash, Tezpur-based Defence PRO Lt Col Sobmit Ghose said. “The Mi-17 V5 chopper was carrying supplies to a forward post in the hilly terrain. It crashed close to the dropping zone and caught fire immediately,” an IAF spokesperson said in New Delhi. The Russia-made copter was on its  second sortie of the day. On an air maintenance mission, it was scheduled to drop off kerosene jerry cans at an Army camp in Yangste, he said. Tawang SP Manoj Kumar Meena told The Tribune over the phone that the crash occurred around 6.30 am, 130 km from Tawang, after the chopper had taken off from the Khrimur helipad.A rescue team comprising Army and IAF personnel rushed to the crash site and found the bodies, which were transported to the IAF base at Tezpur, Assam.The crash comes two days ahead of Air Force Day on October 8 and is the second incident involving IAF helicopters in Arunachal Pradesh in three months. An Advanced Light Helicopter of the IAF had crashed at Saglee in Papum Pare district on July 4, claiming four lives.Minister of State (MoS) for External Affairs Gen VK Singh (retd) expressed grief over the loss of lives.