JAKARTA • The Indonesian authorities said they have found the wreckage of the Aviastar airline Twin Otter turboprop aircraft that went missing over Sulawesi island last week with 10 people on board.

The plane was found in the Enrekang region, around 240km from the port city of Makassar in South Sulawesi, MetroTV reported yesterday.

South Sulawesi police official Adex Yudiswan said yesterday that residents had found the plane. He gave no details about its condition or the fate of the passengers and crew.

The Aviastar plane lost contact with airport authorities last Friday during a flight from the town of Masamba, about 30 minutes before it was scheduled to land in Makassar.

Indonesia has had three major crashes over the past year, including an AirAsia flight that went down in the sea between Surabaya and Singapore on Dec 28, killing all 162 people on board.

In August, a passenger airliner crashed in the eastern province of Papua, killing all 54 people on board. More than 100 people were killed in June in the crash of a military transport plane in the northern city of Medan, prompting the government to promise a review of the ageing air force fleet.

According to Aviation-safety.net, Aviastar has had four fatal incidents, including that of a British Aerospace 146-300 aircraft in Papua in 2009, killing all six crew members on board.

REUTERS