June 8 (UPI) -- The Myanmar military confirmed Thursday that it recovered the bodies of several passengers from a missing military plane in the Andaman Sea.
Search and rescue teams found wreckage and debris from the aircraft, a Chinese-made Shaanxi Y8-2004 four-engine turboprop plane, in the water Wednesday. The discoveries came about eight hours after contact with the plane was lost. They also found the remains of 10 people, including one child, were found Thursday. The fuselage, the main body of the plane, has not been located.
The plane carried 108 passengers -- including 14 children and a total of 58 civilians -- and 14 crew members. The other passengers were military personnel. It was traveling from Myeik Air Base to Yangon, about 350 miles, on a flight path over the Andaman Sea, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing said Wednesday in a statement.
Communication with the plane was lost about 30 minutes after the plane departed the air base.
The cause of the crash has not been identified. No distress signal was received, and although the plane took off in bad weather, there were no weather problems in the crash area, the BBC reported Thursday.
Nine ships and three aircraft of the Myanmar military were searching for wreckage Thursday.
