Did a mystery plane crash on Belize’s border with Mexico?
There have been reports of a downed plane somewhere near the Belize Mexico border in Orange Walk since Wednesday morning. But several fly-overs by the Belize Defense Force and Belize Police Department have yielded nothing. News Five spoke today with the B.D.F.’s Chief of Staff, Colonel Ganey Dortch.
Via Phone: Lt. Col. Ganey Dortch, Chief of Staff, B.D.F.
“We got unconfirmed reports of a possible aircraft crash-landed in the northern portion of the country in the Blue Creek area. As a response to that we deployed our aircraft to search the area and to date to no avail. We haven’t been able to actually confirm yes there was an aircraft that crash-landed. It’s not officially a search because we haven’t had any reports from the Civil Aviation Authorities saying that a legal aircraft did declare any distress, we just got rumors that an aircraft crashed in the northern portion of our country. We have done all within our capability to do a detailed search of the area and we have come up with nothing.”
Marion Ali
“So is it possible that it could have been on the Mexican side of the area?”
Via Phone: Lt. Col. Ganey Dortch
“That might be a possibility, but we have notified our Mexican counterparts and they have actually also sent people to that area to confirm if that rumor is true. It’s an agricultural area where the Mennonites operate and it’s near the Blue Creek, La Union area. La Union is on the Mexican side and Blue Creek is on the Belizean side. It is generally in that vicinity there.”
Marion Ali
“La Union would be the area where a lot of contraband activity takes place right?”
Via Phone: Lt. Col. Ganey Dortch
“That’s correct.”
Marion Ali
“And illegal activity—I mean drug related activity?”
Via Phone: Lt. Col. Ganey Dortch
“The entire northern portion of the country is allegedly being used for drug transshipment so that’s a possibility too. We couldn’t fly much yesterday due to the weather but this morning we did another search of the area.”
Marion Ali
“Yeah, but you’re saying right now that is not what you’re picking up?”
Via Phone: Lt. Col. Ganey Dortch
“That’s not what we’re picking up because normally an airplane in distress has a frequency or what we refer to as ELT that sends out signal and we’re not actually picking up a distress signal from any airplane in that area.”
The B.D.F. has covered from Aguas Turbias, which is the point where the Mexican, Belizean and Guatemalan borders meet, up to Indian Church and to New River Lagoon.
