'Nothing found in ISRO aircraft's 41 photos'

Hopes of finding an early clue about the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy's missing helicopter suffered a setback as nothing could be found in the 41 photographs taken by a special aircraft of the Indian Space Research Organization.

The Chief Secretary of Andhra Pradesh government Ramakant Reddy told mediapersons after midnight that there was no trace of the missing aircraft in the photos which the aircraft had taken while flying over the Nallamalla forest area in Kurnool district.

He indicated the satellite images of the United States could be more helpful if and when they are received as requested by the state government through government of India.

The ISRO was also trying to deploy its Radar Imaging Satellite to gather information and the photographs on Thursday.

The failure of ISRO aircraft in getting the pictures of the missing chopper in the region is being attributed to a variety of reason, notable of them being the adverse weather conditions.

This was in addition to the data gathered by the state-of-the-art fighter aircraft Sukhoi which flew to Andhra Pradesh from Bareli in Uttar Pradesh and undertook aerial survey of Nallamalla forest area.

The unmanned craft, which the defence ministry had promised to send could not reach on time. Ramakant Reddy said that it was somewhere in the North Eastern Region and sending in to Nallamalla region was not possible immediately.

The photos taken by ISRO's aircraft were delivered to the National Remote Sensing Agency in Hyderabad for digitization and analysis.