RAVENNA, Italy: Italian Coast Guard divers searching for a missing American F-16 and its pilot were focusing yesterday on waters where a fishing boat found debris believed to belong to the jet, a Coast Guard official said. The debris, including fragments of carbon steel, was found floating in the northern Adriatic overnight, Rear Admiral Francesco Saverio Ferrara said. The US Air Force said in a statement yesterday it was thought to be wreckage from the missing aircraft.
“We hope to find out more during the day so we can have a more complete picture of what happened,” Ferrara said.
The missing jet took off from Aviano Air Base on a training exercise on Monday evening, and the control tower lost contact with the plane at about
1900 GMT.
Search-and-rescue operations are being conducted by sea from the port of Ravenna, and Air Force planes from Aviano are spearheading the search from above, Ferrara said.
Reuters
