Americans among dead in crash of plane on counter-drug mission

     
Three American contractors and a Panamanian National Guardsman were killed on Saturday when a small plane on a US counter-drug mission crashed in a remote, jungle region of northern Colombia.         

Two other Americans on board the Dash 8 plane were seriously injured.           

The two injured Americans were rescued by Colombian soldiers and taken to a hospital in the capital, Bogota, US Southern Command said in a statement.            

The twin-engine turboprop plane went down near the Colombian city of Capurgana, close to the border with Panama.          

"The plane was completely destroyed. I couldn't identify any registration, absolutely nothing. It was left completely charred," said a Colombian military officer at the scene.         

The plane was tracking a suspected smuggling vessel along with a Colombian vessel over the western Caribbean when it lost radio contact, according to a spokeswoman for the US sponsored multi-national task force that runs drug operations in region.           

The cause of the crash is not yet known.         

The region where it crashed is mountainous jungle and rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, operate there along with drug traffickers.           


AP