Eighteen months after an Air Services Limited aircraft mysteriously vanished from an Anna Regina airstrip, authorities are still stumped as to where it might be and according to Crime Chief Seelall Persaud they have not yet been able to establish that foul play was in fact involved in the disappearance. In the meantime, the police investigation is still open.
Contacted recently, Persaud told Stabroek News that a man who was the last person to be seen with the plane was a part owner.
He said that the man and the aircraft were still missing and the police had not determined that a crime had been committed given the fact that an owner was the last person to be seen with the aircraft.
Police had said in a press release shortly after the October 2007 incident that a blue and white Piper Seneca aircraft with red stripes and the marking 8RGAA on the tail disappeared from the airstrip between 8 am on Sunday (October 14) and 7 am on Monday (October 15).
The missing craft had been sold by Air Services to Fenix Airways the month before but the foreign based company had not paid in full and as such the registration of the craft remained with Air Sevices pending full payment.
The plane according to reports this newspaper received had left the Air Services hanger at the Ogle Aerodrome on October 14 with a flight plan to land at Anna Regina.
Following the disappearance there was speculation that if the aircraft had been stolen it could be in the hands of drug traffickers operating between Guyana and Venezuela.
Residents in the Anna Regina area had told this newspaper they had seen the aircraft circling before touching down on October 14.
They had seen, they said, what appeared to be persons refuelling the plane before it took off again.
The Anna Regina airstrip is an open field and is not usually used for commercial flights as these normally utilize the Hampton Court airstrip. The airstrip is also surrounded by bush and is not visible from the road.
General Manager of Air Services Ltd, Fazel Khan had told Stabroek News that it was highly likely that the aircraft had left the country.
As the police here intensified their investigations, four men and a woman were held for questioning, among them three directors of Fenix Airways Inc, the company which bought the plane from Air Services Ltd.
Attorney-at-law Anil Nandlall who was representing some of the detainees told Stabroek News that one of the pilots of Fenix Airways had travelled to Essequibo on October 14 with his family.
Nandlall said the pilot had left the aircraft on the airfield to escort his family to the home of a relative and by the time he returned it had vanished.
The suspects were subsequently released.
