Medical transport plane goes MISSING in Hawaii, search operations underway

A medical transport plane with three crew members on board went missing on a flight between Maui and the Big Island. According to Xinhua news agency, citing a tweet from the US Coast Guard, the Hawaii Life Flight aircraft was a King Air twin-engine prop plane. According to the US Coast Guard, the Honolulu Control Facility reported losing radar contact with the plane about 15 nautical miles offshore south of Hana, Maui.

"Global Medical Response can confirm that one of our Hawaii Life Flight emergency fixed-wing airplanes based in Maui went off the radar while en route to pick up a patient in Waimea, Big Island," the company statement issued Friday said.

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The patient was not on the plane, which lost radar contact at about 9:30 p.m. Thursday, it said. "We are in the process of reaching out to their families," the statement said. The company is also assisting search and rescue teams. The Coast Guard said aircraft controllers lost radar contact with the plane about 17 miles (27 kilometers) south of Hana, Maui, in the Maui Channel of the Pacific Ocean.

The Coast Guard says it is searching with boats, a helicopter, and a cargo plane. The guard said one of its aircraft spotted a sheen in the search area. It also reported one of its patrol boats recovered debris in the area, but it said there was no confirmation that it was from the missing plane.

Global Medical Response said it has temporarily paused Hawaii Life Flight transports. Governor Josh Green issued an emergency proclamation allowing the state to supplement Hawaii's medical flight capacity with aircraft and crews from other states. Green said he's coordinating with Hawaii Life Flight and state, county, and federal agencies to ensure uninterrupted emergency transport between Hawaii's islands.

Many hospitals on Hawaii's more rural islands are small and offer limited medical services compared to Honolulu's larger hospitals. Patients with more serious, urgent conditions often need to be transported to Oahu for care. Green is also a physician and long worked as an emergency room doctor on the Big Island before becoming governor this month.

With agency inputs