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Debris of a Myanmar military plane which went missing today with more than 100 soldiers and family members aboard have been found in the Andaman Sea.
Navy ships and aircraft had been searching since the afternoon when the plane lost contact with air traffic controllers at about 1:35pm off Myanmar’s southern coast.
More than a dozen children were believed to be among the passengers on the plane travelling from the southern city of Myeik to Yangon.
“Now they have found pieces of the damaged plane in the sea 136 miles (218 km) away from Dawei city,” said Naing Lin Zaw, a tourism official in Myeik, adding the navy was still searching the sea.
An air force source confirmed to AFP that a navy search and rescue ship had found pieces of the plane in the sea an hour’s flight south of Yangon, commercial capital of Myanmar.
There was conflicting information about the number of people on boar but some reports say there were 116 people on board – 105 pasengers and 11 crew when it took off.
The passengers were believed to mainly be family members of military men based in the coastal region.