Manila, Philippines—A Philippine Air Force (PAF) FA-50 fighter jet and its two-man crew are missing after flying in support of ground forces fighting communist rebels in the southern Mindanao region, a military official said Tuesday.
Air Force spokeswoman Colonel Consuelo Castillo said the jet was flying “over land” on the way to its target area when it went missing during a “tactical night operation in support of our ground troops.”
While she declined to provide mission specifics, Philippine Army spokesman Colonel Louie Dema-ala confirmed to Agence France Presse (AFP) that the missing FA-50 was part of a squadron sent “to provide air support” to troops fighting communist rebels in Mindanao’s Bukidnon province.
Lieutenant-Colonel Francisco Garello of the 4th Infantry Division told AFP that air support had been called in overnight during a firefight with the New People’s Army in a mountainous area.
“There was a firefight between the 403rd Infantry Brigade (Philippine Army) and the rebels, and they made a request for air support, so the air force supported the encounter,” said Garello.
The long-running Maoist insurgency is now believed to have fewer than 2,000 guerrilla fighters.
Local search efforts
In an earlier statement, the Philippine Air Force (PAF) said the missing jet had lost contact with other fighters in the group “minutes before reaching its target area.”
While the air force has only confirmed the plane as “missing,” a disaster official in Bukidnon province told AFP preparations were being made for community-based forest rangers to search the area where the fighter’s signal was lost.
“We are sending two teams up tonight to the area, one in Mount Kilakiron (2,329 meters, 7,641 feet) and another in Mount Kalatungan (2,880 meters),” said Ramil Gulahab. The latter is the fifth-tallest mountain in the Philippines.
“They will conduct a search there because that was where the signal was lost,” he said, adding he had been contacted by the air force as he was a reservist.
The fighters flew out of Mactan–Benito Ebuen Air Base, which shares a runway with the airport in Cebu, the Philippines’ second-largest city.
PAF spokeswoman Castillo told reporters it was the “first major incident involving” its squadron of FA-50s, which have previously been used in exercises over the disputed South China Sea.
The Philippines has a dozen of the fighters purchased from South Korea in the last decade.
“We are hopeful that we will still be able to recover” the aircraft and crew, Castillo said. “We are still very optimistic that they are safe.”
Deadly accidents
The FA-50s have taken part in joint air patrols with treaty ally the United States over the contested South China Sea, where China and the Philippines have been involved in increasingly tense confrontations over reefs and waters.
Beijing claims almost the entirety of the crucial waterway, through which trillions of dollars in commerce transits each year, despite a Hague ruling that its assertion has no legal basis.
Local outlet the Inquirer reported in January that the Philippine government was considering purchasing 12 more FA-50s.
There have been a number of deadly accidents involving Philippine military aircraft in recent years.
Last April, two navy pilots died after their Robinson R22 helicopter crashed near a market south of the capital Manila during a training flight.
Two PAF pilots were killed in January 2023 when their Marchetti SF260 turboprop plane crashed into a rice field.
